On a cold winter’s day on 29th of November 1985, Gerard Hoarau the exiled head of the MPR and President of the SNM was walking home from visiting his doctor on the relatively quiet streets of Edgware in London. He was on his own and probably deep in thought. On his shoulders lay the hope and aspirations for freedom of the Seychellois nation.
He was just about to put the key into the lock of his door to go in when ...a cowardly assassin suddenly opened fire from behind emptying thirty two bullets from a sterling sub machine gun into his body with a few smashing into the front door of the house shattering the windows and wooden frame. Gerard crumpled to the floor under the hail of bullets as the assassin melted away never to be seen again.
Andre Laporte his close friend with whose family Gerard shared a house, came out in a state of shock to see Gerard lying on the door step in a pool of blood. He bent down on his knees and tenderly held Gerard’s head in his hands. As Gerard gurgled and fought for breath, Andre urged his dear friend to hold on as he tried to reassure him that the ambulance was on its way. Gerard, his pained eyes wide open but unable to speak, blood pouring out from his multiple bullet wounds; the bridge of his nose shattered by one of the bullets; looked up at his friend and from the corner of his big blue eyes, tears started streaming down the blood soaked cheeks of his face. “It was as if he was trying to speak with his eyes”, Andre recalls as he describes the scene that he says will haunt him for the rest of his life. Gerard’s favourite thick, dark green corduroy coat, a present from his mother and father was completely blood soaked and literally shredded to threads by all the bullets that had peppered his body.
Minutes later Gerard was taken away in an ambulance still fighting for his life. The bullet that eventually killed him had entered in the back of his neck exiting through his nose.
On that fateful day, a peoples’ hero; a cherished son and brother was brutally murdered by cowards, but a martyr and a legend was born. In his own small way Gerard has joined an august band of martyrs such as Mahatma Ghandi, Martin Luther-King, and John F Kennedy not forgetting his own martyred Seychellois countrymen, Hassan, Simon, Mike, Alton, Son, Jean, Bernard, Tony, Michel, Gilbert.... Today their stars shine brighter than ever in the skies of the Seychelles.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%A9rard_Hoarau
By Josette Hoarau
Minutes later Gerard was taken away in an ambulance still fighting for his life. The bullet that eventually killed him had entered in the back of his neck exiting through his nose.
On that fateful day, a peoples’ hero; a cherished son and brother was brutally murdered by cowards, but a martyr and a legend was born. In his own small way Gerard has joined an august band of martyrs such as Mahatma Ghandi, Martin Luther-King, and John F Kennedy not forgetting his own martyred Seychellois countrymen, Hassan, Simon, Mike, Alton, Son, Jean, Bernard, Tony, Michel, Gilbert.... Today their stars shine brighter than ever in the skies of the Seychelles.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%A9rard_Hoarau
By Josette Hoarau
