By Pat Azzopardi Preziosi:
I saw this photo and I started crying again.
I cried for the stolen childhood of three boys who have had to live their lives knowing that their mother was hated, maligned and lied about.
I cried because these three boys couldn’t really bond with their beloved pets because their pets were so often poisoned or had their throats slit.
I cry for her parents, siblings, her husband, and the extended family, who have had to live the past thirty years hearing and reading about their loved one being treated the way she was by her compatriots.
I cry still for them still. When the people who actually commissioned this horrific murder are placed behind bars, perhaps then, I will be able to remember without crying so much.
I cry for the family, who have to live the rest of their lives knowing that their loved one was snatched away from them in such a brutal manner.
She was no saint, of course. None of us are. However, in her position, I think I would have been even more caustic and bitter if I had had to suffer the incessant and vicious attacks she went through.
The 1980s! What turbulent times those were! I remember them well. I remember Daphne’s writings at the time and my undying admiration for the brave patriot she was. I admired her then, and I admire her still. How I used to wish I had the guts to voice my opinion so openly. But I was a coward.
I was a coward still throughout the years from then until 16th October 2017.
It was only her death that has made me decide to live by Paolo Borsellino’s words:
I cry for my country, populated as it is by so many hard-hearted, cruel, unloving, egoistic and avaricious citizens. Yet, I am a Christian, and I believe the words quoted in John 12, 24: “Very truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds”.
We are living through the most important week for believing Christians. I firmly believe that Daphne’s death has not been in vain. I believe that the country she loved so dearly – so much more than life itself – will, before too long, arise, and the tidal wave of support for the Common Good will finally be unleashed.