Desmond Tutu

Desmond Mpilo Tutu graduated from Unisa with a BA in 1954.

Desmond Tutu, Anglican Archbishop Emeritus of Cape Town and Nobel Peace Prize winner, was South Africa’s foremost voice of conscience. He raised national and global awareness of issues including xenophobia, homophobia, and human rights abuses in Zimbabwe and Palestine. Tutu was born in Klerksdorp, where his father was a teacher. He himself acquired a teaching diploma, simultaneously earning his BA through Unisa. After three years of teaching, he resigned in protest of the Bantu Education Act and studied for entry into the priesthood. He earned an MA in Theology at King’s College, London, and on his return to South Africa in 1975, became the first black Anglican Dean of Johannesburg.  As Tutu’s theological career blossomed, he became a prominent opponent of the apartheid state, also opposing all political recourse to violence. After the transition to democracy, he made a principled contribution to national healing in the aftermath of apartheid as Chair of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

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