Post date: Dec 14, 2013 5:50:28 PM
South Africa's retired Archbishop Desmond Tutu will not attend the state funeral of his friend and fellow Nobel peace laureate and anti-apartheid hero Nelson Mandela.
MTHATHA, EASTERN CAPE, SOUTH AFRICA (DECEMBER 14, 2013) (REUTERS) - Many South Africans voiced disappointment on Saturday (December 14) after it was announced that retired Archbishop Desmond Tutu would not be attending his friend and fellow Nobel peace laureate Nelson Mandela's state funeral on Sunday (December 15).
A spokesman for Tutu, Roger Friedman, said the Anglican prelate was not accredited as a member of the clergy for the event in Qunu in Eastern Capeprovince, but government officials insisted he was on the guest list.Mandela, who died last week at the age of 95, had a close friendship with Tutu forged in the struggle against apartheid. So his absence from the global icon's final farewell raised questions about the outspoken clergyman's strained relationship with the current South African government and ruling ANC party.
The controversy emerged as Mandela's body was being flown to the Eastern Capeprovince for Sunday's funeral, which will be attended by Britain's Prince Charles and U.S. civil rights activist Reverend Jessie Jackson, among others.
Citing a statement made by Tutu's daughter the Reverend Mpho Tutu, Friedman said the archbishop was not an accredited clergy person for the event and therefore wound not be attending.
But foreign ministry spokesman Clayson Monyela said that Tutu was definitely on the guest list. She said she suspected the issue was whether he was asked to provide any official duties as a clergy person at the funeral.
Mourners who gathered in Mthatha to watch Mandela's cortege pass through on its way to Qunu, said they were saddened by the news.
"I would say that's wrong, just because Tutu was with him from way back, he was supposed to be in the function. Definitely he was supposed to have come," saidZuqko Makaratzo.
"It's very bad for Desmond Tutu because they were bringing the reconciliation - Tutu with Mandela. So, I'm very sad about that," added fellow resident, Tabitha.
"We didn't know about that that Tutu was not invited to the funeral and we are very sad because Tutu was the best friend of Mandela. We are very sad about that," saidBrenda.
Another resident Khaya Molaoa said that whoever decided to not invite the archbishop must have had "their own reasons."
Both Tutu and Mandela used to live in Vilakazi street in Soweto, Johannesburg - the only street in the world which was a home to two nobel laureates.
On Saturday Vilakazi residents reacted to the news. Some spoke warmly about the archbishop and his close ties with Mandela, while others said he should put his close friendship with Mandela ahead of politics.
"Upon hearing the news I was very appalled. I think whoever, I don't want to say it's the ANC, I just say whoever did not invite him they are being petty. They should have been beyond these petty issues, and I mean Tutu was Madiba's friend and everybody knows that," said Bongeni Magapula.
Another resident Roena Andani accused Tutu of abandoning Mandela.
"It doesn't suit me well because Nelson Mandela was always with Desmond Tutu, he was with him all the time, he didn't abandon him, but what Desmond Tutu is doing is abandoning Mandela, because he should respect Mandela because Mandela is a hero, because we have lost a great hero," she said.
Soweto resident, Sydney Cindi, said it was up to the archbishop to decide whether or not to attend.
"In our culture we don't invite to the funeral, we all know it's Tata's funeral, if he feels like going to then it's up to him," Cindi said
"It's impossible that Tutu won't be going to the funeral, he is a very respectable man, he has to go to the funeral. I believe he will be there, it can't be true that he is not going," added fellow resident, Sifiso
At a mass memorial ceremony for Mandela on Tuesday (December 10) inJohannesburg, Tutu was not initially on the speaker's list but he was eventually invited to the podium and tried to calm an unruly crowd that had booed PresidentJacob Zuma.
In his autobiography 'Long Walk to Freedom,' Mandela warmly described Tutu as "a man who had inspired an entire nation with his words and his courage, who had revived the people's hope during the darkest of times."
Since the end of apartheid in 1994, 82-year old Tutu has become a fierce critic of the ruling Africa National Congress (ANC), accusing it of losing its way and straying from the ideal of a "Rainbow Nation" of shared prosperity that he and Mandela had envisaged.
Tutu has criticized Zuma's leadership and in 2004, under then President Thabo Mbeki, he accused the ANC of promoting "kowtowing" and said its black economic empowerment (BEE) policies were helping only a small elite.
Mbeki gave a scathing response, saying Tutu's comments on economic empowerment were "entirely false" and accusing him of "empty rhetoric".
Tutu remains one of the country's leading moral lights and chaired the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, the body set up after the end of apartheid to examine human rights abuses.