ARCHBISHOP DESMOND Tutu has praised Irish people for their support of the anti-apartheid struggle in South Africa and their continuing charitable efforts in his country.
Speaking at a civic reception in his honour at the Mansion House in Dublin yesterday, the Nobel peace laureate said: “You have been wonderful in your generosity to us and to people in other parts of the world who have been less well off than yourselves.
“One of the wonderful things about yourselves has been your capacity to remember how you were when you didn’t have the Celtic Tiger. You supported us at the time of our struggle against apartheid.”
He also commended charities such as the St Patrick’s Trust – of which he is patron – and the Niall Mellon Trust, whose work showed how Ireland was “seeking to accompany us on the much more difficult terrain that you have to traverse when freedom comes”.
A quarter-century after the archbishop won the Nobel Peace prize and singer Bob Geldof released Band Aid’s Christmas single, both men are due to speak at a lecture in NUI Galway tomorrow.
The event is being hosted by NUI Galway’s (NUIG) Literary and Debating Society, which says it is delighted to welcome two “giants of human rights” on campus.
Archbishop Tutu, on whom the Nobel prize was conferred in 1984 for his anti-apartheid work, will be speak on aid, justice and charity.
He will be presented with the society’s president’s medal by Geldof, whose human rights work dates back to release of the Band Aid charity single, Do They Know It’s Christmas, also in 1984.
Entry to the event at NUIG’s Áras na Mac Léinn at 5pm tomorrow will be by ticket only.
Tickets are available in Áras na Mac Léinn or from Zhivago’s on Shop Street, Galway, with proceeds going to a charity of Archbishop Tutu’s choice.