While the People Sleep, Misery Remains Awake

One does not inherit a homeland; one builds it every day, with the courage of one who wakes and says: today, I still believe.

🌍 Preface of the Author

Every morning I awaken halfway through a dream.

I am at home, in Angola.

I see joyful streets, children with backpacks and bread,

neighbors greeting one another in hope.

I see dignity growing like cassava in the rain.

But then I awaken, and the dream vanishes.

Reality weighs like red-hot iron.

And what I feel is not merely longing: it is duty.

A duty to speak, to teach, to rebuild.

Dreaming of a just Angola is not nostalgia, it is resistance.

Because the dream is the first act of liberty.

And a people who dream, even while starving, is still alive.

This manifesto is precisely that: a seed of lucidity.

It is not against anyone; it is for the truth.

It does not point a finger, it raises a mirror.

And it says: no more sleeping with open eyes.

🩸 I. Heritage and Deception

We inherited a fertile and exhausted land.

The soil that sustains us also weeps.

Independence brought the flag, but not justice.

The colonizer left, and greed stayed, wearing a new suit.

Oil flows like burning blood, and diamonds glitter in hands unfamiliar with sweat.

Luanda shines in glass towers, yet the musseque remains varnished in mud.

On one side, luxury masquerading as progress; on the other, patience killing slowly.

For half a century the story repeats like a litany.

They call it governance, but it is the commerce of consciences.

And while the people wait, misery does not sleep, it works, it grows, it multiplies.

It is not divine curse, it is human negligence.

Freedom without morality is a river without a source.

And a people that trades truth for silence signs its own servitude.

Because deception, when institutionalized, becomes culture.

“Whoever grows used to lies forgets the taste of truth.”

⚖️ II. Truth Instead of Rhetoric

Power speaks, the people respond.

And there is an abyssal distance between speech that deceives and words that liberate.

For years they sold us promises wrapped in speeches.

They called hunger “crisis,” unemployment a “transition,” inequality “growth.”

But truth, left under the sun, began to stink.

And whoever tries to expose it is quickly called a traitor.

The homeland does not fear truth; only impostors do.

The homeland wants to be looked in the eyes, with respect and courage.

There are worn, empty, hollow words: diversification, inclusion, prosperity.

These are coins of speech that no longer buy trust.

In the musseque, the verb “to eat” still awaits conjugation.

In schools, the verb “to learn” has lost chalk and roof.

“Enough with rhetoric: truth doesn’t need applause, it needs an echo.”

Thinking ceased to be a luxury; it became a duty.

Truth is light, and light is the only weapon darkness fears.

And when conscience awakens, misery begins to lose its sleep.

🌱 III. What to Do With What We Have

No one builds tomorrow with what they wish they had; we build with what we have.

Reconstruction will not come from ministries; it will come from awakened minds and joined hands.

1️⃣ Educate to Liberate

To educate is to free from fear.

A local radio can be a school.

A mobile phone can be a library.

A conversation beneath the mulberry tree can be a university.

Knowledge is the only resource that increases when shared.

2️⃣ Build Bridges of Knowledge

The diaspora is an extension of the homeland.

Each Angolan abroad is an antenna of wisdom.

Let us create mentorship circles; five young people guided by a brother in the world.

This is not charity, it is reconnection.

The mind that teaches from afar, without show, plants the future in silence.

3️⃣ Unmask with Proof

Shouting feeds hatred; proving destroys lies.

Let us make truth a tool, not a weapon.

Let us show numbers, data, maps.

Let every citizen learn to investigate, compare, demand.

Lies fear the graph, for it does not yield to emotion.

4️⃣ Celebrate the Small Heroes

The heroes of Angola don’t wear uniforms nor have escorts.

They are those who do good unseen:

• The nurse who teaches after her shift;

• The farmer who reinvents the old motor;

• The youth linking villages via mobile network;

• The woman who transforms sharing into bread.

These are the invisible pillars of the future.

5️⃣ Restore Dignity through Work

To work is to pray with the hands.

But work only dignifies when justice is present.

Let us create cooperatives, gardens, workshops, local projects.

Do not wait for the State’s salvation; let us be the State in motion.

With little, we can do much, when the much is done together.

🕯️ IV. Message to the People

O my people, people of sun and laughter, of struggle and faith,

hear me as one who remembers you.

Within you is a strength older than fear.

Do not say “they should,” say “I begin.”

Do not wait for orders, begin the act.

Real power does not lie in ballots; it lies in awakened conscience.

“Whoever lies to the people destroys the ground on which they stand.”

The era of saviors is over; the era of builders begins.

Rise with what you have, faith, hands, courage.

The hero of the new times is collective, anonymous, stubborn.

Angola, my red and wounded land,

you who were a weeping girl and now are a woman of courage,

your children are everywhere

they have not forgotten you; they have gone to fetch the tools to rebuild you.

“I promise to think before believing.

I promise to act before complaining.

I promise to teach what I know and respect who I am.”

This is the new anthem of the awakened homeland.

No hatred. No fear. No fatigue.

Only the deep desire to live in truth.

🌅 Epilogue: Oath and Dawn

Dawn is born in a field that was sown

with ancient pain and blood that seeks no vengeance;

in the chest the dream is both flame and hope,

on the land of the fatherland love is resurrected.

The soul lifts the sleeping people,

the sun warms them and hunger no longer tames;

there is no master of bread, nor the old scent

of fear upon divided faces.

And I swear, Angola, with faith that does not go out:

to serve you in word, gesture, and memory,

without bowing to gold nor intrigue.

Let the people be the sap of this saga,

and freedom, eternal, your glory,

sworn in pain, reaped in former peace.

✍️ Author’s Signature

I am João Elmiro da Rocha Chaves - “Mákalé.”

Engineer, Cold War survivor, and guardian of Luso-Angolan memory.

I build memory for machines and preserve the memory of a people.

From the plateau of Cela to the valley of the Keve, from the diaspora to the homeland,

I carry with me the voices that time tried to silence.

My words are a bridge, between who we were and who we can still become.

“Truth needs no noise, only a heart that dares to speak it.”