Cape Town | Monday
SOUTH Africa had overcome apartheid and its people had it in them to overcome the ”awful” challenges of Aids, poverty, crime and corruption, Archbishop Desmond Tutu said on Sunday.
In an interview on SABC’s Newsmaker programme to mark his 70th birthday, he said the trouble with many South Africans was that they did not know how much the outside world admired the country.
”We did something here that nobody believed was going to happen, everybody thought this country was going to be overwhelmed by a bloodbath.”
Tutu — the recipient of the 1984 Nobel Peace Prize – was chairman of the country’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), that looked into the atrocities of the apartheid era.
Tutu said he was glad that the trade unions and the religious community had teamed up to say ”let’s stop fiddling while our robe is burning” on HIV/Aids.
”Discussing whether this is the cause or that is the cause… that is a luxury we cannot afford.”
”Let’s stop playing marbles and roll up our sleeves, and invoke the spirit that inspired all of us to win the struggle against apartheid.”
HIV/Aids, poverty and crime were the new enemy in South Africa.
Asked about the many South Africans choosing to leave the country to settle abroad, Tutu said all South Africa needed were a few ”small victories” to lift the morale of the people.
”I believe fervently that we must not give up on our people.”
He denied rumours and reports that he was leaving our shores to take up residence in the United States.
”Home is here, this is a great, great country.”
Tutu said he was incensed by a recent newspaper report that he was to take up a lecturing post at Harvard University in the United States.
The report said the move had been initiated by the US in an effort to improve relations with South Africa.
He said there was no truth in the story, which he described as presumptuous in that it attempted to portray him as a ”great fixer-up” of all problems.
The former cleric said he felt good and ”tremendous” to be alive.
The knowledge that he had a life-threatening disease had instilled a new intensity in his life and he felt more appreciative of things around him.
”I’m feeling good,” he said.
Tutu returned to South Africa a little over a year ago following surgery for prostate cancer.
On the September 11 suicide attacks on the United Stated, Tutu said he was so far amazed by the restraint that had been shown, in that there had not been a ”knee-jerk response” as some expected.
The perpetrators had to be brought to book, but this should not be based on conjecture, but evidence that would stand up in a court of law.
The response to the attacks should not be in the ”same league of awfulness” as the outrage that provoked it, he said.
It was important for the world to look at what led to such acts of terror.
”I’m glad to say there are very many people in the United States who’ve been saying ‘hey, we’ve got to look at ourselves, we’ve got to do some introspection”’, he said.
A concert to celebrate Tutu’s 70th birthday is expected to be held at St George’s Cathedral in Cape Town on Wednesday, and would include performances by the Cape Philharmonic, St George’s Singers, University of Cape Town choir and the university’s choir for Africa. – Sapa