Mourners in South Africa paid their respects to anti-apartheid campaigner and Nobel laureate Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu at an official state funeral held in Cape Town on Saturday.
The late Anglican archbishop, who rose to prominence in the 1980s for his strong opposition to racist apartheid rule in South Africa, died last week at the age of 90.
“Our departed father was a crusader in the struggle for freedom, justice, equality and peace, not just in South Africa, the country of his birth, but around the world as well,’’ President Cyril Ramaphosa said at the official funeral service at St. George’s Cathedral.
Tutu served as the first black archbishop of the cathedral in the 1980s, and he won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1984.
He was the last surviving South African Nobel Peace Prize laureate.
Ramaphosa hailed Tutu for his contributions to nation-building, saying his life spanned an epoch in South African history that has now come to an end.
"Though we say goodbye to him today with the heaviest hearts, we salute our beloved archbishop for all he did to build this nation," Ramaphosa said.
Tributes poured in from across the world to express grief at Tutu’s loss.
Hundreds of people paid their respects at the cathedral, where Tutu’s body was taken.
Tutu, also fondly known as "the arch," previously served as the chairperson of South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which was set up by the new democratic government in 1995 to help heal and reconcile the country by uncovering human rights violations committed during the apartheid regime.
His body was laid in state in a simple casket at the cathedral. It will be cremated and the ashes interred at the cathedral.
