South Africans mourn as Desmond Tutu, anti-apartheid hero, dies at 90
Archbishop Desmond Mpilo Tutu, who was at the forefront of the campaign against apartheid legislation and violence in South Africa in the 1980s and early 1990s, has died.
Tutu, born on October 7, 1931, in Klerksdorp, South Africa, died at 90 in Cape Town on Sunday, December 26, 2021.
“He was a patriot without equal; a leader of principle and pragmatism who gave meaning to the biblical insight that faith without works is dead. We pray that Archbishop Tutu’s soul will rest in peace but that his spirit will stand sentry over the future of our nation,” South African President Cyril Ramaphosa said in a statement announcing Tutu’s death on Sunday morning.
Tutu, a teacher before becoming a priest, rose to global prominence for using the pulpit to campaign against apartheid and violence amid the violent agitations that engulfed South Africa following the apartheid legislation.
The apartheid legislation birthed violence in South Africa from the late 1940s to the early 1990s. It created racial segregation and economic and political discrimination between whites and non-white South Africans.
Tutu, an ally of Nelson Mandela, won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1984.
