"At that time, however, the comrades became very concerned and did not like it. Equality's reaction to this was that it was a reactionary speech that wanted to humiliate the working class. There was a reference to the fact that the workers worked for Germany until the assassination of Heydrich, so they worked quite willingly for Germany. And they turned all these statements of his around and wrote a very harsh article against my father. To speak out against him - the Communists were then run by Schling, and he realized that he could try his hand at this, how he could control society. So he wasn't allowed to give the lecture the next day. The whole academic world backed away from him, the army too, they were waiting to see what would happen, but the students weren't waiting. The students wanted to continue, they wanted the lecture next. Well, because the comrades had picked up the workers from Zbrojovka to go and demonstrate against Major Šoffra, they went, completely disoriented. They absolutely didn't know what they were against or who they were against, they thought it was against Spain, they shouted such slogans and went to the equipment. They didn't hit the equipment. They went to the industrial plant, where they broke the windows. Now the students from engineering and the students from medicine. I was surprised at that, because for me the medical students were very friendly to the comrades. But they weren't at that time, so they were defending their faculties from the crowd that flocked there and that broke the windows. And the students from the construction plant got into a clash with the editorial staff of the Rovnost, because when they walked by the Rovnost, they started doffing their hats as if they were bowing respectfully to the leading force, which in our country is the Communist Party, they were making fun of it. They comrades dragged the two into the passage and beat them up. It was quite a massacre. My father was already completely sidelined, because nobody stood up for him, even when it was discussed, for example, in the House of Commons. MP Slavík, who supposedly lives in Brno but we never met, stood up for him. Peroutka in the newspapers. The American ambassador sent a dispatch saying that democracy was not quite right here. That was in 1946."
"He was invited to the Tech to give a lecture. At that time, a new branch was established. It was called conscription education. And it was considered very important because it was after the war. We didn't defend ourselves in the war. So it was to show how to behave when threatened. My father prepared a lecture. The first one was on January 30, 1946. It was for construction workers, first year. It was in the Metro Cinema, because otherwise there were no suitable premises yet. The whole general staff was there, and the technical authorities - the rector, the deans, and the lecture was a great success. Father spoke about the fact that we must defend ourselves when there is danger around us, that we must not pretend that it doesn't concern us, that we must be ready to defend ourselves, that we must fight for freedom. He also quoted Masaryk that we must fight with iron, that we must not allow inferior people to lead us. And that the intelligentsia has a huge responsibility and that it has to lead the nation. And I read the lecture. Nowadays, if the language was modernized, it might as well be on the front page of any newspaper."
"But I visited him [dad] there, at Mírov. So I had that experience because I wasn't a schoolgirl yet. How old could I have been? About four or five. The experience as we approached that Mirov. And that was a castle for me, because I lived in Ivančice, there's not even a castle there. So I didn't know anything like that, a building like that. And this Mirov, it's a huge castle, a black-priest's castle. But I wasn't scared, I was pretty hardened when I was a kid. And then it turned out to be my essential quality. And it's a great advantage that I'm not afraid. So we came into this room, we were let in, bare, there was nothing. Just a door in the back, in the back wall, and a grill. But just a wooden one. Then the door opened and a man came running out, all grey hair, and he jumped over the bar and took me by the arms. And I - I didn't like it. I was ashamed. I was too big to be held. And my mother said to me, 'Put it in his mouth.' She gave me some vitamins. 'Put it in his mouth.' So I put it in his mouth, a strange man, right. Of course he had to let me go, that was unacceptable. So we were there for a while. But I didn't even realise it was dad. To me, he was a stranger who was there talking to my mother and quite sadly, that. Well, and then they chased him back again."
She was born on 21 February 1937 in Brno as an only child to her parents Vlasta and Vladimír Bohumil Šoffra. Her father was in the Czechoslovak army, her mother came from a family of teachers. Vlasta spent her childhood in Slovakia, where her father was a staff captain of the general staff. After the occupation, his activities in the army were suspended, so he joined the anti-Nazi resistance in a group formed around Major Schmoranz. The group was betrayed. Her father was arrested in 1939 and imprisoned in several concentration camps, including Auschwitz. After the war he returned to his family and was reactivated in the army. In 1946 he was commissioned to lecture on national defence at Brno universities, which was very popular with the students. However, it was a thorn in the side of the communist public. The situation escalated into the so-called Šoffra Affair, during which Brno students clashed with workers from Zbrojovka. After 1948, his father was accused of collaboration with the Germans and expelled from the army. In spite of this cadre profile of the family, Vlasta studied geology. In 1962 she married the painter Vladimír Svoboda. After 1989 she became involved in public life. In 1990 she became a member of the newly founded Christian Democratic Party (KDS) and later of the Civic Democratic Party (ODS). In 1996 she was elected senator and in 2002-2006 she served as deputy mayor of the Brno-střed district. At the time of the filming in 2024, she lived in Brno and raised two children with her husband.
Hrdinové 20. století odcházejí. Nesmíme zapomenout. Dokumentujeme a vyprávíme jejich příběhy. Záleží vám na odkazu minulých generací, na občanských postojích, demokracii a vzdělávání? Pomozte nám!
