THROUGH THE MANY YEARS THAT I REPORTED ON SOUTH AFRICA, I had recurring appointments with Desmond Tutu (1931-2021) to interview him for whichever media outlet I happened to be working with at the time. We called them our ‘catch-up interviews.’   Here below is a condensed version of one such exchange, conducted this century, plus a reflection on another from the last century.

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From 2008, published in Maryknoll magazine:

SOUTH AFRICA‘s ARCHBISHOP EMERITUS DESMOND TUTU looked momentarily disturbed at my question: “President Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe has called you an embittered, evil little bishop. What’s your reaction?”

Then his signature flash of a smile quickly returned. “Oh, I learned in the apartheid days to develop the skin of a rhinoceros,” he said. We were discussing the turbulently changing scene in his home region of southern Africa, and especially the economic and political disaster overtaking Zimbabwe.

Tutu shakes his head these days in sadness more than anger about neighboring Zimbabwe’s calamitous conditions. Time was, Tutu recalled, that the two nations were unified in similar, ultimately successful struggles against white supremacy. Now, 28 years after Mugabe gained power, 76-year-old Tutu believes the former freedom-fighter has turned into a cruel dictator. 

“He is someone I used to have a very high regard for. And he must be given credit for what he did. But it’s an inexplicable aberration that has taken place – this almost, you’d say, perverse determination to destroy his own country and bring about huge suffering unnecessarily for many of the people.”

The retired Archbishop of Cape Town and 1984 Nobel Peace Prize-winner is no stranger to human aberration. After a lifetime of defying the outrages of apartheid, he was asked by Nelson Mandela, as first president of a majority-ruled South Africa, to chair the national Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC). This was the new country’s bold and innovative attempt, starting in 1995, to move on from the brutality of its recent past by facing it squarely and, wherever possible, healing some of its worst effects.

That powerful, heart-rending exercise lasted through three years, and many of the Commission’s sessions were broadcast live on national television. In his chairman’s seat the Archbishop was seen breaking down in tears as he heard testimony from victims and bereaved families about vicious torture and killings. The Commission divided its work into investigating human rights violations, formulating proposals for restitution and – crucially and controversially – assessing whether individuals should be granted immunity from prosecution.

In an approach deliberately designed to avoid the taint of ‘victor’s justice’ (as, for instance, in the Nuremberg trials after World War II) Mandela’s young government had decided that amnesty could be given to perpetrators of abuses during the apartheid era if their crimes were “politically motivated” and “proportionate,” and as long as the abusers fully disclosed what they had done.

Few would claim the TRC finally presented a perfect solution to South Africa’s violent legacy, but it has impressed many across the world with how it helped to reinforce South Africa’s peaceful transition from outright repression to a fairly healthily functioning democracy. [Note: This pre-dated the country’s downturn under Jacob Zuma‘s corrupt presidency.]

TUTU IS NATURALLY PLEASED by the number of visitors from the world’s varied troubled societies who come to consult him on lessons to be drawn from the TRC, yet he was emphatic in contradiction when I quoted reports that he viewed the Commission as “a paradigm” for other nations. 

“No, no, no, no, no,” he said, thumping the table vigorously. “No one should ever make out that we have provided the world with a universal paradigm, that we are saying this is one size that fits all. That would be arrogant in the extreme. In a very real measure, it is something that is ad hoc. It must be specially designed for each country.”

“But,” he added, “there are certain principles that you could say might be of universal application.“

Specifically, Tutu reflected that for him the strongest TRC lesson was an appreciation that “there is an incredible generosity and magnanimity on the part of people. Almost everyone who has suffered is not so much desperate for revenge. More important, they want to know the truth. And most want to be able to tell their story. And when perpetrators admit their guilt, it’s far more healing.”

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Reflection from 1994:

DURING THE LONG STRUGGLE to defeat apartheid in South Africa, my most frequent interviews with the Archbishop were in the 1980s and 1990s.

During one of those interviews, not long after Nelson Mandela had finally been released from prison, I asked the archbishop how it was that Mandela not only seemed capable of putting behind him the brutalization he had suffered at the hands of his jailers for much of his 27 years of captivity, but also showed every sign of guiding all his country’s citizenry through a transition to democracy without violent recrimination or revenge.

Tutu said I should not be surprised at the promising way that events seemed to be heading – and indeed as they turned out, when South Africa’s journey of reconciliation did eventually prove to be a modern marvel for the world. There had been times when that outcome was far from certain, for instance an especially tense period I witnessed when political murders were occurring at the rate of ten per day. I asked Tutu why he had such confidence in Mandela’s stewardship. “David,” the archbishop said, “you must never underestimate the power of prayer.”

I felt stung into correcting the cleric. I had spent much of the previous decade interviewing many of Mandela’s friends and supporters, including his then-wife and his personal physician, and had inquired quite searchingly into Mandela’s overall philosophy of life. “I know for a fact, Archbishop,” I said confidently, “that Mandela is not a praying man. I don’t believe he’s even a Christian.”

Tutu was shaking his head and smiling by now. “I was not talking about Nelson,” he chided me. “There have been millions of people around the world praying for him, and for a peaceful outcome to the struggle.”