I admire young people who are concerned with the affairs of their community and nation perhaps because I also became involved in struggle whist I was still at school.

When the water starts boiling it is foolish to turn off the heat.

I am not an optimist, but a great believer of hope.

To go to prison because of your convictions and be prepared to suffer for what you believe in, is something worthwhile. It is an achievement for a man to do his duty on earth irrespective of the consequences.

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

We understand and promote the notion that while children need to be guided they also have an entrenched right to be whatever they want to be and that they can achieve this only if they are given the space to dream and live out their dreams.

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.