OPINION: Humour, and a great sense of timing, were among the Arch’s greatest assets. He had an extraordinary ability to diffuse tension, contain anger and remind people of their human essence, writes Patricia de Lille.
THE apartheid regime knew what to do with people it regarded as “opstokers” (instigators). It bristled with the weaponry to subdue them. Intimidation, banning, banishment, arrest, assault, torture, imprisonment and murder, among them. Together with the cold-heartedness to use them without hesitation.
But in Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Mpilo Tutu, it encountered an “opstoker” it couldn’t contain. They couldn’t contain him because despite the brutal imposition of a rigid racial hierarchy, which should have kept him in his place, he lived his life at a higher level of humanity than they did.
Their bullets couldn’t reach him. They couldn’t reach him because he was a Christian leader and they purported to be Christians, because he was internationally regarded as more moral than they were, and because they found it difficult to contradict him – he spoke plain truth to power.
His attendance at demonstrations and marches constrained the police. They were much less likely to open fire or start beating people up. The late Professor Jakes Gerwel, who was the vice-chancellor of the University of the Western Cape in the 1980s, where the Arch was chancellor, would call the Arch to attend demonstrations on the campus specifically to protect the students from police excesses.
Not that the Arch ever regarded himself as bullet-proof. He attended marches with a small bag of toiletries under his cassock, including his toothbrush, in case of arrest.
When they did, on occasion, arrest him, he insisted on sharing his food with the police. He embarrassed them with his humility and humanity – besides the media outrage that would follow.
Archbishop Tutu was many things to many people. He was a pastor, spiritual leader, activist and healer. He opposed racial discrimination and, equally, all other forms of discrimination and injustice: economic, gender, sexual orientation, religious, culture, geographic, environmental…
Although he was a Christian leader, he did not appropriate God for Christians, alone. The God he worshipped was not a Christian but the God of all. The God of the human family, with a sense of humour – and definitely not a misogynist or a homophobe.
Humour, and a great sense of timing, were among the Arch’s greatest assets. He had an extraordinary ability to diffuse tension, contain anger and remind people of their human essence. He used humour to convey important messages, and had a peculiarly contagious laugh.
I remember attending a meeting in a community hall in Woodstock, in the mid-1980s, when state oppression was at its worst. The Arch was the main speaker, and many speakers spoke before him. The people were angry, and by the time Arch took the stage they were well warmed-up.
Preceding his address with a trademark giggle – hee, hee, hee – he begins by telling the audience that Zimbabwe is a land-locked country, but has a Ministry of Fisheries and Harbours. But that’s not so extraordinary, he says. South Africa has a Minister of Justice, but it has no justice.
Despite our anger we couldn’t help laughing at the ridiculousness of what he was pointing out. And while we laugh, he’s watching us, almost with a quizzed expression – I’m watching you! – because when we get past the joke he has some very important things to say. I remember he was very hard-hitting that night.
By the time he finished, with another joke, we’d all agreed that the situation we were in was unbecoming, inhuman, and we shouldn’t tolerate it. He wanted to know what each and every one of us in the room was going to do to make things better. He reminded us of our worth and seemed to absorb a lot of our pain.
At the time, I was a trade unionist, employed at Plascon and representing the South African Chemical Workers Union.
Years later, after the negotiations and first national election, as a Member of Parliament I watched him playing the identical role in his position as chairperson of South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission.
He absorbed an enormous amount of victims’ anguish and sorrow. He sobbed openly. It was while this gruelling process was under way that he was first diagnosed with prostate cancer.
When I was appointed as mayor of Cape Town, I was finally in a position to contribute to paying something back to this visionary leader and exquisite human being, on behalf of his adopted home city.
One of my predecessors had set aside a valuable piece of land opposite the Convention Centre in the city centre on which the vision of a Desmond Tutu Peace Centre would take root. But raising the kind of capital required for such an undertaking was proving a bridge too far.
Rather than risk losing the opportunity to honour the Arch’s legacy, and perpetuate his teaching, we swapped the idea of developing a greenfield project in favour of restoring a valuable and historic building to house his ongoing work for the next 200 years (that’s the duration of the lease).
That building, the Old Granary, built over 200 years ago, is today the home of the Archbishop Desmond Tutu IP Trust, the Office of the Founders, and the Desmond and Leah Tutu Legacy Foundation – and will soon open the doors to a permanent Desmond Tutu Exhibition.
When we look for the Archbishop’s set of human attributes and skills in today’s crop of national and international leaders, we understand the void he leaves behind. It is our hope that the Granary will play a prominent role in distilling some of his magic for perpetuity.
No tribute to the Arch is complete without at the same time acknowledging the role of the incisive woman in his life for 66 years, Mama Leah. She set out on what was meant to be a relatively regular journey of togetherness and love, foregoing her qualifications to build a family. But the Archbishop’s work and travels made things a little more complicated than either could have foreseen.
Mama Leah stepped up with grace and aplomb, doubling up the roles of motherhood and chief earthly adviser.
We know how much she loved Soweto, and yearned to return there when the Arch finished his term as Archbishop of Cape Town. Ultimately Soweto’s loss was Cape Town’s gain, and we can’t pretend we’re not very grateful for that.
May the Arch rest in peace, and our gratitude for his loving kindness, example and inspiration uphold his family in this time of grief.
* Patricia de Lille is leader of the GOOD party, and Minister of Public Works and Infrastructure.
IOL