On November 25, 1989, Emil Ščuka and Jan Rusenko spoke to a crowd of hundreds of thousands in Letná in Prague. They also reached most households through television cameras. At the same time, a Roma group unfurled the Roma flag on the Letne plain, and a huge crowd chanted “Long live the Roma”.
Prior to that, Czech Roma dissidents were practically inexistant. The only notable exception was Karel Holomek, a signatory of the Movement for Civil Liberties (HOS), established in 1988. Holomek, expelled from the military college after 1968 and expelled from the Communist Party of the Czech Republic, was detained and interrogated as early as 1981 for “subversion of the republic.”
- Romové a Sametová revoluce v roce 1989. „Ať žijí Romové“ skandovalo 800 tisíc lidí na Letné. In: Romea. 17.11.2024. https://romea.cz/cz/domaci/romove-a-sametova-revoluce-v-roce-1989-at-ziji-romove-skandovalo-800-tisic-lidi-na-letne-3
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