PhDr. Josef Josefík

"The situation had developed in such way that I was called by the director of school department and he told me: ‘Well, you are now in the charge of the marriage counselling and you work with the youth, so it is necessary for you to publicly denounce Charter 77 in the local newspapers.’ Well, and I refused, I said that I do not consider it appropriate to refuse such material and that it is primarily necessary to publish it. And then, the people can decide whether they will or will not agree with it. But I cannot request the condemnation in advance without granting the public the possibility to familiarize themselves with such material. I really tried to argue why it is necessary to made such material public and why it is for me absolutely out of the question to denounce it. I expected it will cause such a kind of a reaction the but I was nevertheless surprised that I was fired on the same day."

“At that time, I attracted attention of the police because at the occasion I bought so called petrol designated for lighters at a tobacconist. These were such small ampoules from which petrol could be squirted out if the ampoule was pierced with a pin. And during the ceremonial procession I stood among my classmates and squirted petrol on those lanterns and many of them ignited. I was caught by a policeman dressed in a uniform, brought to the school and the headmaster, who was a very strict lady, told the policeman: ‘But that is impossible, he is our best student! And he is the chairperson of his class!’ And I have the feeling that because of the lack of evidence, probably, I was pardoned by the headmaster back then. Or I was slapped, I am not so sure nowadays.”