Sport has the power to inspire and unite people. In Africa, soccer enjoys great popularity and has a particular place in the hearts of people. That is why it is so important that the FIFA World Cup will, for the first time ever, be hosted on the African continent in 2010. We feel privileged and humbled that South Africa has been given this singular honour of being the African host country.

A free press is one of the pillars of democracy.

If you sit down and talk to a person, it's easy to convince him that apartheid can never save a country and will lead to the slaughtering of innocent people - including his own people.

Our experience has taught us that with goodwill a negotiated solution can be found for even the most profound problems.

For me, nonviolence was not a moral principle but a strategy; there is no moral goodness in using an ineffective weapon.

I found solitary confinement the most forbidding aspect of prison life. There is no end and no beginning; there is only one's mind, which can begin to play tricks. Was that a dream or did it really happen? One begins to question everything.

Good men and women can be mobilized to ensure that South Africa is united and that the spirit of reconciliation is strengthened and that progress in this country takes place as fast as it can.