The late John Garang
[Lessons From The Archives: 2004 Speech by Dr. John Garang]
The following remarks remarks are excerpted from a speech by the John Garang, the leader of the Sudanese People’s Liberation Movement/Army, available on YouTube. The nationalist and Guerrilla leader earned a master’s degree in agricultural economics and a PhD from Iowa State University.
We as Sudanese have a concrete anchor. We have an anchor in history……
We go back a long ways. And sometimes it is necessary to go back in order to go forward. And we need to make this exercise in the Sudan so that we can find out bearings. Because if you don’t have a past then you cannot possibly have a future….
We did not fall from the sky. We have been here all along. There is also a series of books ‘The General History of Africa,’ by UNESCO, volumes One to Seven. Volume Two covers the Nile valley and the Horn of Africa. I recommend that you read — you acquire and read this book.
It is by UNESCO and is authoritative. It has lots of research. I also recommend that you read a lot about ancient Egypt which is very much interconnected with the Sudan. We have a long history.
Peoples and kingdoms have lived, thrived and disappeared in the geographical area now that constitute the present Sudan. Yet and despite all this wealth of historical evidence, the present and previous rulers in Khartoum present a false picture of our country. As if the Sudan started with them.
And is if the history and reality of the Sudan consists only of specific parameters — Arabism and Islamism. We are much bigger that than that.
Our contention in the SPLM is that the Sudan belongs to all the peoples that now inhabit the country . And its history, its diversity and richness, is the common heritage of all the Sudanese people.
It is important to establish this firm anchor in history. And to affirm that the Sudan, and that we the Sudanese are a historical people. And let no one push you off the rails of history.
