Everything about Canaan Banana totally explained
Canaan Sodindo Banana (
5 March,
1936 10 November,
2003) served as the first
President of Zimbabwe from
18 April, 1980 until
31 December, 1987. A
Methodist minister, he held the largely ceremonial office of the presidency while his eventual successor,
Robert Mugabe, served as Prime Minister.
During his lifetime, Banana brought together two of the country's political parties, the
Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU) and the
Zimbabwe African People's Union (ZAPU), became a diplomat for the
Organisation of African Unity, and headed the religious department of the
University of Zimbabwe. His later life was complicated by charges of
sodomy - a crime, in Zimbabwe - which he denied and for which he was later imprisoned.
Early life
Banana was born in 1936 in
Esiphezini,
Southern Rhodesia. His parents were a
Ndebele-cultured mother and a
Malawian father who had emigrated to Rhodesia. He was educated by missionaries in a local school and was later schooled at a teacher training institute.
He married
Janet Banana (born 1938) in 1961, and they'd four children together. He took a diploma in theology at Epworth Theological College in
Harare and was ordained as a
United Methodist minister in 1962. Becoming involved in politics, he denounced
Ian Smith's practices as a prime minister, took part in the uprising of the black liberation movement, and rose to be vice-president of the
African National Council.
Under the country's new constitution Banana became the first president in 1980 and first black leader of Zimbabwe. post was taken over by Mugabe, who made himself executive president. Banana then became a diplomat for the
Organisation of African Unity and head of the religious department at the
University of Zimbabwe. He played a large role in bringing the two major groups of independence fighters,
ZANU and
ZAPU, together to form the
Zimbabwe African National Union - Patriotic Front, a merger that took place in 1988.
Sodomy charges and imprisonment
The former president's later years were clouded by scandal. In 1997, Rev. Banana was arrested in Zimbabwe on charges of
sodomy, following accusations made during the murder trial of his former bodyguard, Jefta Dube. He fled to
South Africa while on bail before he could be imprisoned, apparently believing Mugabe was planning his death. He returned to Zimbabwe in December 1998, after a meeting with
Nelson Mandela. Banana was sentenced on
January 18,
1999 to ten years in jail, nine years suspended and he was also
defrocked. He actually served six months in an open prison (being allowed to leave for shopping) before being released in January 2001, and died of cancer in 2003 in
London, according to the Zimbabwean High Commissioner. The
Guardian Unlimited, however, claims that Banana had travelled to South Africa, where he eventually died, in order to receive appropriate treatment for his cancer.
He was buried in Zimbabwe without the full honours expected to be accorded to a former head of state.
His wife sought asylum in
Britain in October 2000.
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