Dili, August 14, 2026 (Media Democracia) – Students Who Love Nature (ESHANA) hold a FALINTIL march to commemorate the 51st FALINTIL Day.
The theme for this year’s FALINTIL march is “One March, a reconciliatory wave of palm leaves.”
The march took place today, and the route that ESHANA will follow starts from Kraras to Manuboe, from Loihuno passing through Builó, continues through Nahareca and Uaibobo, and ends at the grandeur of Mount Matebian to honor the martyrs.
Chief of the General Staff of the Defense Force (CEMGFA), Lieutenant General Domingos Raul ‘Falur Rate Laek’* said: you will not walk on a random path. You will walk along the strategic axes that FALINTIL once crossed, where each path equally represented both hope for survival and the imminent risk of death.
“You will come to know the natural resources that sustained the guerrillas during times of great deprivation. You will identify the refuges that protected the guerrillas from enemy encirclement. You will understand how the very topography of this land the valleys and the depths, the forests, the mountain ranges once became a protective blanket for those who had nothing but a firm conviction that Timor-Leste’s beloved land would live free.”
Lieutenant General Domingos Raul said this in his speech during the ceremony of the 51st FALINTIL Day march at the F-FDTL General Headquarters in Fatuhada this Thursday.
The Chief of Staff said this march is more than a physical exercise — it is turned into a true act of national memory.
“Our first duty is to remember that the land we step on today is not ordinary land. It is land consecrated with sacrifice, a silent witness to the heaviest years of our resistance.” He continued.
He said to the ESHANA students: you are the new guardians of this memory. The FALINTIL fighters did not just leave you a history of war.
“They left you a lasting example of discipline, love for this land, and resilience in the face of adversity. May this march serve you as a life lesson, where the mountain itself teaches what no book can fully teach.” He affirmed.
The Lieutenant General added that this march is simultaneously an homage and an act of reconciliation.
“The young people who today walk each trail do so not with bitterness toward the past, but with a firm commitment that the blood spilled on these mountains will not be spilled again. Instead, it will become a permanent root for national unity.” He said.
ESHANA Coordinator, Inocêncio Mauputar de Deus*, also said: in this walking journey, ESHANA goes with a spirit that, even in today’s situation, this journey comes with strong thoughts and will continue.
“We are the generation that will carry on and spread our long history the history that our heroes and heroines went through so that we could have this nation. We have come again to continue. We have come again to fight, not for independence, but for development and for the moral struggle that the new generation needs to pay attention to.” he said.
He affirmed that this walking journey is not just a sport, but a journey filled with the spirit of nationalism and patriotism.
“It’s a journey that teaches us not only to take care of our physical health, but to teach us how to feel and remember the difficult situations that our fighters once faced.” He concluded.
Reporting: Estefania Cardoso
Photo: F-FDTL Official Page