San Miguel de Allende, Gto. President Felipe Calderón declared that the best tribute we can pay national heroes, like Guanajuato locals Hidalgo and Allende is to join forces to achieve their ideals, beyond party, ideological and regional banners.
During the re-inauguration of the Allende Museum House, as a tribute to Captain Ignacio Allende, he said that, “History must serve to construct the present and prepare us to strengthen the future.”
In San Miguel de Allende, Guanajuato, accompanied by state governor Juan Manuel Oliva Ramírez, the President declared that an ambitious program is in place to commemorate the Bicentennial of the Independence and the Centennial of the Revolution in 2010.
“We are going to act in a coordinated fashion with various states and institutions. I hail the fact that CONAGO, the National Governors’ Conference, has agreed to liaise and coordinate with the National Commission organizing the celebrations for 2010, the Year of the Fatherland.
He said that 2010 will be a year of joy and happiness, in which pride in being Mexican and pride in our history will make itself felt in every home, school, neighborhood and every public square, particularly in San Miguel de Allende, the Cradle of Independence.
President Calderón declared that the Year of the Fatherland will be a time to reflect and celebrate and to “ask ourselves, after 200 years of Independence, what Mexico wants to pass on the generation of tomorrow, how we want Mexico to be in the next 200 or 100 years or even the next 10 years.”
He said that it is possible to look ahead, as Captain Allende did, “And become the Bicentennial Generation, a generation that will be able to overcome short-term adversity, with an eye on the future.”
He urged the country, when it is celebrating Independence and the Revolution, to trace the route of Mexico’s future too.
He said that in order to celebrate the Bicentennial, the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH) refurbished the Allende Musuem House to restore its appearance and original size, in order to showcase the origin of San Miguel de Allende and the life of pre-independent Mexico.
Moreover, he added, the INAH is investing in the remodeling and improvement of other emblematic sites of the Independence, such as the Hidalgo Museum House, Francia Chiquita, in San Felipe Torres Mochas, where he was parish priest for many years, and the Alhóndiga de Granaditas Regional Museum of Guanajuato, also in the city of Guanajuato.