Under a grey sky and drizzle, mourners were ushered into the cathedral. Rains, according to historian Khaya Ndwandwe “are a blessing” and shows that Tutu’s “soul is welcome” to heaven.

Mourners included close friends and family, clergy and guests, including former Irish President Mary Robinson, who is to read a prayer.

Others mourners were Elita, the widow of the last apartheid leader FW de Klerk, who died in November.

Conspicously absent from the funeral is one of Tutu’s best friends, the Dalai Lama. He failed to travel due to advanced age and COVID restrictions, his representative Ngodup Dorjee told AFP news agency outside the church.

Tutu’s longtime friend, retired bishop Michael Nuttall, who was Anglican Church dean when Tutu was the archbishop of Cape Town, will deliver the sermon.

The two forged a strong relationship, illustrating for many how a white leader could work for a Black leader. Nuttall went on write a memoir titled Tutu’s Number Two about their friendship.

Tutu’s moral firmness and passion went hand-in-hand with self-deprecatory humour and a famously cackling laugh.

Less than a kilometre away, dozens of people watched the funeral broadcast from a big screen despite earlier rains.

“Mandela’s gone, the really great people who liberated the country” are dying, bemoaned photographer Brita Lomba, 66.

“I loved his humour! Very witty,” said 63-year-old housewife Washilah Isaacs, adding that she also liked Tutu’s support for Palestine.