Boraine hailed by Tutu as great South African
“A GREAT South African.”
That was how Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu described former Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) vice-chairperson Alex Boraine, 87, at his memorial service in Cape Town.
He said the country owed Boraine a great debt of gratitude for his outstanding service.
“I’m afraid if people were giving congratulations and chose me to be the recipient, they were wrong, very considerable credit must go to Alex and to the regional leaders, in Joburg, KwaZulu-Natal, East London and in Cape Town,” Tutu added.
Among the dignitaries at the memorial were former mayor Patricia de Lille and close family and friends of Boraine.
He passed away in his sleep at home last week. Tutu expressed his disappointment because Boraine would not be honoured with an official state funeral. “It would have been fitting for our president to give Alex an official funeral I’m sad that this has not happened,” he said.
Mayor Dan Plato paid tribute to Boraine at the last council meeting of the year.
Boraine and fellow Progressive Party MP and party leader Van Zyl Slabbert left Parliament in 1986 to start the Institute for a Democratic SA (Idasa) in 1987.
The TRC heard 20 000 testimonies from South Africans affected countrywide by the horrors of apartheid.