Happy Birthday Desmond Tutu!

Archbishop Desmond Tutu, whom the Mail & Guardian describes as a "Rabble-rouser for peace" is turning 75 and is as feisty as ever. Tutu's outspokenness has earned him occasional opprobrium, but on the whole, the Nobel Peace Prize laureate has always been a voice of conscience. In my work on South Africa in the 1980s I have seen the remarkable ways in which Tutu stood up against the state while at the same time proved willing to step into dangerous situations to promote peace among Africans who saw no hope in peaceful resolutions. By the middle of that tumultuous decade even Tutu understood that sometimes violence might be necessary, but he always pushed for other options to be exhausted. He was the public face of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which he chaired, and was one of the most vocal advocates of South Africa's spirit of ubuntu,, a difficult-to-define word that essentially means "humanness."

Tutu still speaks out against moral decay and what he sees as the failings of many who once stood at the forefront of the liberation struggle in South Africa, despite the fact that he long ago earned the right to settle into a peaceful retirement. Happy birthday, Archbishop Tutu, one of the Founding fathers of the new South Africa, the Rainbow Nation of God. Long may you prosper.