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Phyllis Ntantala Jordan Quotes

Browse 3 quotes about Phyllis Ntantala Jordan.

Phyllis Ntantala Jordan Quotes

“Only those who have had to leave home know the unspeakable pain involved. No words can describe it. Much as the situation was ugly in South Africa, and still ugly today, South Africa is my home. I love it. No place in the world is like that country to me. For all its ugliness, it is my home, the place where my roots are, and I love it. This is what is so painful. Even now it is still my hope that I'll go back to live there. It is the only place where my soul can find rest and peace.”

“I left because the ground in which I could operate was shrinking, getting smaller and smaller. I felt it was better to carry on the struggle outside, rather than risk going to jail to rot there doing nothing. This I have done. But the struggle for liberation cannot be carried on outside the country; it is inside the country. That is where the battle is and where it will be won. When Fikile Bam came out of Robben Island after ten years, in his first letter to me he wrote: 'Mama, we have decided to remain in the country. The struggle is here and not outside.' This was in response to my efforts trying to get him out of the country. Fikile was right,”

“A flock without lambs is doomed. A herd without calves has no future. A people whose children are doomed to ignorance has no future. It is our children who are, by this Act, condemned to a world of darkness and ignorance, who will never fit in anywhere in the world after being shut away from the rest of humanity by Bantu Education. If we all realise that, we cannot, no matter what the odds, stand idly by and let that happen. Where are the mothers in this hall who will say: 'Never! Not to my child!'? Where are the women of this nation who will say: 'Never, not to our children!'? Have we less courage than the mother-hen, that will dare the falcon that swoops down on her young? I do not think so. Let us take a lesson from those mothers in Hitler's concentration camps, who, in a desperate situation, tried to save their children. We will do the same too. We will tell Verwoerd that over our dead bodies will he condemn our children to ignorance. We will tell him: Never, not to our children.”