Archbishop Tutu’s Ubuntu

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When apartheid in South Africa ended in 1994, Archbishop Desmond Tutu preached that the only hope for the country to heal its deep wounds was to turn its back on revenge and retribution and embrace the ancient humanist African philosophy of Ubuntu. The Zulu proverb “Umuntu ngumuntu nag Bantu” means a person is a person through others. Ubuntu states that our humanity is inextricably bound up in others. We cannot live in Ubuntu and violate the dignity or humanity of another. The two are irreconcilable. Twenty years since the Truth and Reconciliation Commission was established, the body chaired by Archbishop Tutu in South Africa after the abolition of apartheid in the 1990s, Audrey Brown investigates whether Archbishop Tutu’s championing of Ubuntu has helped South Africa to heal and embrace forgiveness in the shadow of the Apartheid regime. Audrey meets the current day faithful advocates of Ubuntu, who like Archbishop Tutu, continue to facilitate conflict resolution, defend the persecuted and promote peace. (Picture: F.W. de Klerk, former South African National Party President and Bishop Desmond Tutu, after signing South Africa peace pact, aimed at ending Apartheid. Credit: Laurence Coss/Associated Press)