I could not imagine that the future I was walking toward could compare in any way to the past that I was leaving behind.
A society that does not value its older people denies its roots and endangers its future. Let us strive to enhance their capacity to support themselves for as long as possible and, when they cannot do so anymore, to care for them.
Our human compassion binds us the one to the other - not in pity or patronizingly, but as human beings who have learnt how to turn our common suffering into hope for the future.
Our children are the rock on which our future will be built, our greatest asset as a nation.
Let us give practical recognition to the injustices of the past, by building a future based on equality & social justice.