Angelovski Lazo

Lazo Angelovski was born in Grazhdeno, Prespa region, to the family of a poor farm worker. His father, like many Macedonian people, was forced to go to America as a migrant worker to secure food for his family.

As a result of the careful financial measures taken by his mother and father, Angelovski managed to complete his high school qualification in the Lerin high school.

While still a student in the high school, he suffered many put-downs on the part of the teachers - agents of the Metaxas dictatorship who called him "Bulgarian" or "Neznamis" ["Mr I Don't know"].

But because he was still young, he could not understand the reason for that discrimination against the Macedonian students. Later on, when he entered the ranks of the youth organisation EPON, he understood the substance of the discrimination and what it sought to achieve.

In the time of the Nazi occupation, he worked as a member of the committee of EPON in the village in which he was born, and actively participated in organizing the youth.

After the Varkiza Agreement, he joined the ranks of DAG. He was a modest but at the same time passionate and tireless worker for the struggle for liberation.

When in 1937 there were elections for the organs of the peoples' government in the territories liberated by DAG, Lazo was elected a member of the Lerin Regional Peoples Council. In this post he actively worked for the development of people's councils for the liberation of the homeland.

Lazo was responsible for the national education sector for the Macedonian schools that are formed in the liberated territories. He went from village to village and with youthful glow he worked to eradicate the darkness of illiteracy. "All Macedonian children must be able to learn to read and write in their own mother tongue!" was the catch cry of the CPG, of the people's government. Lazo was one of the first trainers of the Macedonian teachers' courses that were offered in the liberated territories in the period 1947-48.

He also worked in other sectors of the people's government. However he was not satisfied with that. He sought other tasks, which appealed more to his youthful soul and the needs of DAG.

In the summer of 1948 he set off to the Lerin villages to organize. Near the village Buf, he fell into the hands of the enemy. In Lerin he was subjected to dreadful torture but Lazo endured it heroically. Then he was taken to Athens where he was shot dead.

From: For Sacred National Freedom: Portraits Of Fallen Freedom Fighters

© 2009

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