Kofi Annan Quotes

Education is not a luxury, it is a basic human right.

I believe education is the key. As an activist and a child of the developing world, I witnessed education's power to transform lives.

Education is a human right with immense power to transform. On its foundation rest the cornerstones of freedom, democracy and sustainable human development.

I strongly believe that education is a human right and that it's extremely valuable, no matter where you live in the world.

Education is the most powerful tool for everything but certainly to create opportunities for yourself, and I know that not everyone has the privilege of an education like here in America.

The elimination of ignorance, of illiteracy... and of needless inequalities in opportunities (is) to be seen as objectives that are valued for their own sake. They expand our freedom to lead the lives we have reason to value, and these elementary capabilities are of importance on their own

In raising a people from slavery to freedom, you have called them to act on a new theatre; and it is a necessary part of your business, to teach them how to perform their parts.

Education is an important element in the struggle for human rights. It is the means to help our children and thereby increase self-respect. Education is our passport to the future, for tomorrow belongs to the people who prepare for it today.

Everybody agrees that whatever the solutions are to the big problems, they... can never be without some element of education.

The necessary transformation of which I speak and of which my presidency will be a part is built on turning creative possibilities into live realities for all our people.

There are many problems, but I think there is a solution to all these problems; it's just one, and it's education.

Enlighten the people generally, and tyranny and oppressions of body and mind will vanish like evil spirits at the dawn of day.

Every child, and every person, deserves a chance to make something of themselves.

I want education for the sons and the daughters of all the extremists, especially the Taliban.

I am positive that I would see the end of child labour around the world in my lifetime, as the poorest of the poor have realised that education is a tool that can empower them.

I would like to make it so that education was a right, and not a privilege.

Education promotes equality and lifts people out of poverty. It teaches children how to become good citizens. Education is not just for a privileged few, it is for everyone. It is a fundamental human right.

To help people in the third world get educated and learn how to read and write is so important. I mean it is such an important human right.

I don't know why people have divided the whole world into two groups, west and east. Education is neither eastern nor western. Education is education and it's the right of every human being.

Stronger than all the armies is the idea whose time has come. The time has come for equality in sharing in government and education, and in employment. It will not be stayed or denied. It is here.

Our party’s always been the place you can come to wherever there’s injustice. That’s what the Democratic Party’s for. That’s why it was born. That’s why it survives. So the poor and the downtrodden and the bended can have a place to turn.

Give education and knowledge to the common people.

What does the American Negro want? Full citizen status in our American democracy. How shall he reach that goal? By the inward power of the masses. And how shall that power be acquired? Fundamentally, on the highest plane and on the humblest, by a leadership motivated by a world-encompassing philosophy which is rooted in the will of God—a leadership which, itself a vital part of the force of events, is consecrated in humility to the immediate and practical education of the people.

The right to education and to free speech having been gained for woman, in the long run every other good thing was sure to be obtained.

Inter-caste marriages in India are on the rise but still tend to be the province of the liberal few. For much of the country, with its penchant for arranged marriages and close family ties, caste is still a primary determinant in choosing a spouse. Politics is where caste has gotten a surprising new lease on life. After money and education, democracy is, of course, the third powerful force transforming Indian society. But Indians, it turns out, are passionate about the caste of their politicians. Nearly half of the voting population of even a highly educated city like Bangalore considers caste to be the No. 1 reason to vote for a candidate.