🚨 Brief History of KENNETH KAUNDA who led Zambia to independence in 1964.
Kenneth Kaunda, in full Kenneth David Kaunda, (born April 28, 1924, Lubwa, near Chinsali, Northern Rhodesia [now Zambia]—died June 17, 2021, Lusaka, Zambia), politician who led Zambia to independence in 1964 and served as that country’s president until 1991.
What you should know about KAUNDA
* Kaunda employed the Zambia congress as an instrument for executing what he called “positive nonviolent action,” a form of civil disobedience against the federation policy. His campaign had two major results: first, the British government modified the federation policy and eventually agreed to discard it; second, the imprisonment of Kaunda and other militant leaders elevated them to the status of national heroes in the eyes of the people. Thus, from 1960 on, the nationwide support of Zambia’s independence movement was secured, as was too the dominant status of Kenneth Kaunda in that movement.
* Kaunda was released from prison by the colonial government on January 8, 1960. At the end of that month he was elected president of the United National Independence Party (UNIP), which had been formed in October 1959 by Mainza Chona, a militant nationalist who was disenchanted with the older ANC.
.* He imposed economic sanctions against Rhodesia in the 1970s at great cost to his country’s own economy, and in the late 1970s he allowed Zambia to be used as a base by black nationalist guerrillas led by Joshua Nkomo.
* In 1976 Kaunda assumed emergency powers, and he was reelected as president in one-candidate elections in 1978 and 1983. Several attempted coups against him in the early 1980s were squelched. After the presidency
* In 2002 Kaunda was appointed the Balfour African President-in-Residence at Boston University in the United States, a position he held until 2004. In 2003 he was awarded the Grand Order of the Eagle in Zambia by Chiluba’s successor, Pres. Levy Mwanawasa.
Cc: The African History Group
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