Welcome to the page of the State Visit to Angola

To begin with I would like to address a very warm greeting to all who work in Agostinho Neto University, particularly its teaching staff and students.

I greet you as President of Portugal, a nation that shares with Angola the same language, several centuries of common history and, above all, a relation of friendship and cooperation which has become closer year upon year.

I equally greet you as a Professor, knowing the role that knowledge performs in contemporary societies, the responsibility of those whose mission is to prepare tomorrow’s men, and, very specially, the importance that the work carried out in this University means for Angolan development.

Inter-university cooperation is one of the most dynamic areas of the Indicative Programme of Portuguese Cooperation with Angola; it happens that the Faculty of Law of this University was one of the first to sign Cooperation Agreements with the Coimbra and Lisbon Faculties of Law. It shall also be this Faculty of Law that will very shortly mark the beginning of a new stage in this cooperation through an Agreement with New University for doctor’s degrees in Law, which will be stamped by both establishments. It will be a pioneering experience, which will place Portugal on the first row of support in the strengthening of higher education in Angola, at the highest level.

The university is, by definition, an area of learning and research. And, at the same time, an area of dialogue and of meeting: meeting of skills, meeting of generations, meeting of cultures and peoples.

The meeting between Portuguese and Angolans dates back many years. However great the vicissitudes that our relationship may at times have suffered, the current interchange between Angola and Portugal, in the several and decisive sectors of activity which it covers, is the best proof that the bonds that link us are deep and have happily survived all of History’s contingencies.

The most important of these bonds is surely the Portuguese language, the language we all call that of Camões and in which we have understood each other for centuries past. Already António de Oliveira Cadornega, captain and trader who travelled these lands in the XVII century and lived here for a long time transcribed, with pride, in his General History of the Angolan Wars, a letter that was addressed to him, in Portuguese, by Queen Jinga.

Portuguese has made contacts possible between peoples from the four corners of the world. In Africa as well as in the Americas, in India as in the Far East, it was in Portuguese that business was traded as well as all the information available on maritime routes and distant parts, allowing the peoples of those continents to be aware of what went on in the remaining parts of the globe.

Portuguese was, in addition, the component in which a totally new skill was developed, based on experience and diversity of perspectives, a skill that would revolutionize science and unite the planet in anticipation of the global village of our times.

It would not be possible, however, that a language should carry such distinct realities and be the communication tool between such different worlds, if it had not progressively been opened to the influence of the languages of those peoples with whom the Portuguese came into contact, incorporating new words, new expressions, new forms of delivery. Since very early, the reports on journeys that reached us are full of terms until then unknown to the European Portuguese, many of them imported from African dialects such as, for example, Kimbundu.

If Portuguese became, in effect, a global language, it was because it demonstrated the necessary flexibility to assimilate the difference, without however losing its essential unity, and thus guaranteeing communication amongst people that spoke it and continue doing so with the most diverse accents and tonalities.

This unity in diversity that the Portuguese language was able to preserve, is well visible today in the consolidations of the different Portuguese literatures: in each one of them there is a story, a culture and a particular sensitivity which is expressed, but all of them are expressed in Portuguese, and all of them are accessible to whoever knows our language.

The language of Camões is also the language of Luandino Vieira, of Pepetela, of Guimarães Rosa, of José Craveirinha and of so many others that have enriched it with the quality and originality of their work.

Portuguese is, doubtlessly, an inheritance handed down by our ancestors, a common heritage, nowadays shared by eight sovereign States. It is not, evidently, a material heritage. We all know, however, the importance of intangible values for the assertion of identity, of cohesion and influence in the geo-strategic areas in an ever more globalized world.

As much or more than geographic borders, linguistic areas are areas of affinity between peoples and can decisively contribute for the approach of interests among States. We would be turning our backs on reality and making an enormous political mistake if we should consider the heritage which is, for all of us, the Portuguese language, as representing a merely symbolic issue.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

With 250 million speakers, Portuguese is today the fifth most spoken language in the whole world. It has a status of official language in relevant international institutions such as the European Union, the African Union or Mercosur. It enjoys enormous prestige in many regions, both in Africa and in Asia, where there are Portuguese based Creole languages.

Dozens of emigrant communities with Portuguese speaking origins, spread over the five continents, speak Portuguese and want their children to learn it and conserve it, at least as a second language.

To all this human mass is added the number, that does not cease growing, of the many thousand who seek Portuguese, be it for cultural or neighbourhood reasons, be it also, and more than ever, because they recognize that it opens doors in nations whose political and economic weight is growing, such as is the case of Angola, Brazil, or Mozambique. .

In the face of this reality, in the face of this universe that is growing and acquires an increasing importance in the international context of the XXI century, there is only one possible conclusion: we cannot further waste the enormous potentialities that the fact of sharing the same language places within our reach.

It is true that some advances have been achieved. The creation of CPLP, as well as the objectives drawn and the commitments assumed at the many meetings held meanwhile demonstrate, at least, that we stand together in this project and are ready to shoulder our responsibilities. In this sense, the Action Plan approved in the Brasilia Conference and that the Heads of State and of Government will be called upon to adopt, here in Luanda, in the CPLP Summit, is of particular interest.

The revitalizing of the International Institute of Portuguese Language is consigned in its provisions, is a task of great importance and very urgent, and must not become paralyzed as a simple wish.

But if we want Portuguese to attain the international projection and recognition to which it has a right, the first task that we must accomplish is to strengthen its learning as a mother language, as a second language or even as a foreign language.

We all know that the linguistic situation is different amongst the various CPLP States and if in some of them Portuguese is the mother language for the great majority of the population, in others it is merely a second language, although it may have the status of official language. Whatever the case, however, the learning of a language such as Portuguese will always mean, among other things, to have access to levels of training which allow aspiring to better qualified work.

The decisive role of teaching Portuguese as a promotion of social mobility and in combating inequalities is incontrovertible, and to which, however, we did not always attribute due relevance in the past.

In addition it is important that we should continue to invest in the teaching of Portuguese as a foreign language, answering the growing interest that it raises all over the world, amongst students and professionals in every sector.

For this reason, the scarcity of the human resources that allow us to duly answer the needs that these tasks comprise is an issue which requires a joint and common effort within the framework of CPLP.

The projection of Portuguese and the recognition of its role in the contemporary world is a task which we should endeavour jointly. It is in the interest of each and all of our countries that we continue, if possible with greater dynamism, the work carried out until now, aiming towards the international assertion of the Portuguese language, particularly within the framework of the United Nations where its status as an official language has been justified for many years. .

I am certain that we shall be able to face that challenge. I am certain that, together, we shall be able to preserve this heritage that history bequeathed us and turn it, in the future, into an instrument for the development of our peoples.

I end with a word of praise and recognition for the action that Agostinho Neto University has performed for the assertion of this common heritage, to Angola and Portugal, to the Portuguese Language, certain that it will so continue to be in the future.

Thank you very much.