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“If yesterday I fought as an enemy, today you have become a friend and ally with the same national interest, loyalty, rights and duties as myself.”

Source: Independence address to the nation, Salisbury (Harare), 17 April 1980

Context Broadcast the night before independence, after a seven-year liberation war, as many white Rhodesians feared reprisals; it announced a policy of reconciliation.

Portrait of Robert Mugabe
Robert MugabeZimbabwe · 1924–2019
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