Representatives of the Christian, Buddhist, Jewish, Muslim and traditional African religions said prayers in honor of the first black Anglican Archbishop of Cape Town.
During the colorful ceremony in the town hall, many relatives and politicians also wore purple clothes in memory of the purple church robes of the deceased.
An emotional highlight of the memorial service was the appearance of the South African singer Zolani Mahola, who sang an unofficial anthem of the anti-apartheid struggle with the 80s hit “Paradise Road”.
Both the city hall and the famous Table Mountain, which towers above Cape Town, are illuminated in purple at night all week long, also in memory of the Nobel Peace Prize laureate.
Cape Town’s Mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis emphasized to the AFP news agency that the color also has a historical meaning: During protests against racial segregation during the apartheid regime in the 1980s, the police often sprayed demonstrators with violet paint with the help of water cannons to identify and arrest them more easily.
Tutu, who received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1984 for his opposition to the apartheid regime in South Africa, died on Sunday at the age of 90. He is to be buried on January 1st.