Publications
- A life-sized bronze statue of Archbishop Desmond Tutu has been unveiled in Cape Town.
- The statue joins 100 other figures of liberation icons.
- Tutu was remembered at the event for his dedication to human rights.
A life-size bronze statue of the late Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu was unveiled in Cape Town on Thursday, the latest addition to the Long March to Freedom exhibition.
The statue of the Arch will join 100 other bronze statues of iconic resistance leaders.
The exhibition in Century City details South Africa's journey to democracy through life-sized statues of liberation leaders.
Others depicted in the collection are Nelson Mandela, Winnie Mandela, Beyers Naude, Mahatma Gandhi, Albert Luthuli, and Oliver Tambo.
The statue's likeness left Tutu's family visibly emotional.
The head of the National Heritage Project NPC - the owners of the Long March to Freedom - Dali Tambo said Tutu's wife, Leah, had not attended the event as it was a "very emotional moment for her".
OBITUARY | Desmond Tutu: Tenacious, charismatic, and a thorn in the side of the National Party
Tutu's granddaughter, Nyaniso Burris, said: "It looks like him. I wasn't expecting it to look so much like him. It's beautiful. It feels like him. It's such a beautiful rendition of who he was and the memory we have of him. It's amazing that over a year after he passed, he's being honoured in such a way."
The chief executive of the Desmond & Leah Tutu Legacy Foundation, Janet Jobson, said Tutu was a "global signpost" for exceptional leadership.
She added she hoped the statue would inspire a new generation of South Africans to stand for the values Tutu espoused.
Tourism Minister Patricia de Lille, in a message read at the unveiling, said Tutu would most likely have found the "irony that in a crowd of brown statues, skin colour becomes irrelevant" humorous.
She quipped had he been alive to criticise the artists' work, he would most likely have honed in on his nose to ensure "it did him justice".
The Anglican archbishop of Cape Town, Thabo Makgoba, said Tutu was a deeply spiritual person.
"If you visited him in hospital, you would find that it was you, not he, that was the subject of his prayers," added Makgoba.
Tambo said he had always intended to include a statue of Tutu after his death but had not been able to secure funding to make the design a reality.
"We are deeply grateful, as the rest of the world will be, that Woolworths SA stepped in and agreed to cover the costs of making the bronze."
He added the addition of Tutu's statue would "raise the profile" of the exhibition.
"He was a man who occupied a unique position - without being appointed or elected, guided by his faith - as a global moral conscience and human role model," said Tambo.
