Anti-apartheid icon Archbishop Desmond Tutu has passed away at 90, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa said in a statement.
Tutu, the last surviving South African Nobel Peace Prize laureate, died in Cape Town.
“Desmond Tutu was a patriot without equal; a leader of principle and pragmatism who gave meaning to the biblical insight that faith without work is dead,” President Ramaphosa said on Sunday morning.
“A man of extraordinary intellect, integrity and invincibility against the forces of apartheid, he was also tender and vulnerable in his compassion for those who had suffered oppression, injustice and violence under apartheid, and oppressed and downtrodden people around the world.”
Tutu coined the phrase “the Rainbow Nation”, which is often used in post-apartheid South Africa.
He had been fighting prostate cancer for about 20 years.
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The East AfricanNewsEast Africa
Archbishop Desmond Tutu dies at 90
SUNDAY DECEMBER 26 2021
tutu
South Africa’s archbishop emeritus Desmond Tutu. FILE PHOTO | AFP
Summary
Tutu, the last surviving South African Nobel Peace Prize laureate, died in Cape Town.
Tutu coined the phrase “the Rainbow Nation”, which is often used in post-apartheid South Africa.
After independence, Archbishop Tutu chaired the Truth and Reconciliation Commission which was meant to heal a nation emerging from the brutal apartheid regime.
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General ImageBy PETER DUBE
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By LYNETTE MUKAMI
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Anti-apartheid icon Archbishop Desmond Tutu has passed away at 90, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa said in a statement.
Tutu, the last surviving South African Nobel Peace Prize laureate, died in Cape Town.
“Desmond Tutu was a patriot without equal; a leader of principle and pragmatism who gave meaning to the biblical insight that faith without work is dead,” President Ramaphosa said on Sunday morning.
“A man of extraordinary intellect, integrity and invincibility against the forces of apartheid, he was also tender and vulnerable in his compassion for those who had suffered oppression, injustice and violence under apartheid, and oppressed and downtrodden people around the world.”
Tutu coined the phrase “the Rainbow Nation”, which is often used in post-apartheid South Africa.
He had been fighting prostate cancer for about 20 years. Tutu is survived by his wife Leah, four children and seven grandchildren.
Born in Klerksdorp in the then Western Transvaal Union of South Africa in 1931, Tutu’s father was Xhosa while his mother was a Motswana, but they spoke Xhosa at home.
