Jusuf Gërvalla’s words 47 years ago – Donika Gërvalla shares a page from his diary

Justice Minister Donika Gërvalla, the daughter of Jusuf Gërvalla, today shared a page from her father’s diary, written on 30 December 1979, only sixteen days after his escape from Kosovo, as Telegrafi reports.

Donika Gërvalla shared this page from her father Jusuf Gërvalla’s diary on the 81st anniversary of Jusuf’s birth.

In this letter are unfolded the longing for his homeland, the pain of separation from his family and the unshakeable hope for Kosovo’s salvation.

“Dear friends, on the 81st anniversary of Dad’s birth, I want to share with you a page from his diary, written in Ludwigsburg on 30 December 1979, only sixteen days after his escape from Kosovo. Today, in free Kosovo, his remains rest in Dubovik,” Donika Gërvalla writes.

Excerpts from Jusuf Gërvalla’s diary:

[…]

In what a disturbed spiritual state I am all the time can be seen both from the content and from the calligraphy of this writing.

I am justifying myself, saying that it is no wonder. I have been torn away from the land that bore me and fed me for more than 34 years. I have never liked departures from my homeland, not even for short walks, indeed, and somehow I feel as if I have been torn away from the most powerful part of myself.

Behind me I left hundreds and hundreds of political prisoners, who are falling as a sacrifice for the cause of the homeland, among them Hysen and Ekrem; I left my wife with three children and Hysen’s wife with seven children. A great upheaval of homeland and family at once.

We also learned about Bardh that at the Yugoslav Consulate he is in the eye as an enemy of Yugoslavia, therefore, at this moment, I consider him a fugitive as well.

But, despite the feeling of great emptiness as a consequence of this great upheaval, the hope for the salvation of the homeland is keeping me alive. My Kosovo is entering a great danger, but precisely by entering this danger it will also find salvation. I am living my life for free, until I am given the chance (the honour) to give it for Kosovo, for Albania, for Albanianism.

But Mother Albania, what does she say today, I wonder?

Does she have it in mind, and does she have the conditions, to undertake the performance of the duty that has long awaited her?

Our enemy has lost his bearings, has become enraged, has taken off his mask! Thus, in nervousness, one day he will eat his own head, on the road of his own degeneration. At least he will be left without Kosovo and without the Albanians!

Jusuf Gërvalla