The power of imagination created the illusion that my vision went much farther than the naked eye could actually see.

As the years progress one increasingly realises the importance of friendship and human solidarity. And if a 90-year-old may offer some unsolicited advice on this occasion, it would be that you, irrespective of your age, should place human solidarity, the concern for the other, at the centre of the values by which you live.

I don't think there is much history can say about me. I just want to be remembered as part of that collective.

Democracy is based on the majority principle. This is especially true in a country such as ours where the vast majority have been systematically denied their rights. At the same time, democracy also requires that the rights of political and other minorities be safeguarded.

I believe that in the end that it is kindness and accommodation that are all the catalysts for real change.

In some ways, I saw the garden as a metaphor for certain aspects of my life. A leader must also tend his garden; he, too, plants seeds, and then watches, cultivates, and harvests the results. Like the gardener, a leader must take responsibility for what he cultivates; he must mind his work, try to repel enemies, preserve what can be preserved, and eliminate what cannot succeed.

I enjoyed the discipline and solitariness of long-distance running, which allowed me to escape from the hurly-burly of school life.