Kaunda to celebrate in London
2009-04-27 17:00
Lusaka - Zambia's founding president Kenneth Kaunda, referred to by Zambians simply as KK, is not expected to pull out his guitar and sing the blues after the cancellation of a party for his 85th birthday on Tuesday.
Kaunda has instead decided to travel to London to represent Zambia at the celebrations to mark 60 years of the modern Commonwealth.
He was due to attend Queen Elizabeth's reception in Buckingham Palace on his birthday, 45 years after he led the then Northern Rhodesia to independence from Britain.
He started his political career as organising secretary of the Northern Rhodesia African National Congress (ANC) in the Northern province of Zambia.
But in 1958 he broke from the ANC to form the Zambian African National Congress (ZANC). The colonial authorities banned it a year later and Kaunda was imprisoned in the capital Lusaka for nine months.
Humanism
ZANC became the United Party for National Development (UNIP) in 1959. The following year Kaunda was released from prison and elected president of UNIP. He then stared organising civil disobedience known as the Cha-cha-cha campaign.
Using his linguistic skills to appeal to the public, Kaunda won independence for his nation without resorting to violence in 1964. As UNIP president, he ruled Zambia for 27 years.
During his rule, Zambia became a one-party state, effectively giving him absolute control, and he adopted a nationalist-socialist ideology called humanism.
He fell from power with the advent of multi-party democracy. In 1991, he lost presidential elections to Fredrick Chiluba from the Movement for Multi-Party Democracy (MMD) after a fiercely-contested campaign.
Kaunda accepted defeat waving his trademark white handkerchief. Chiluba went on to rule Zambia for 10 years. His MMD has been in power ever since.
Kaunda is applauded for building schools and hospitals - the colonial government made little investment in such areas.
The first Zambian president retired from active politics in 2000 and gave up the leadership of UNIP. This ended a political career that spanned about four decades.
He is currently involved in charity work through his Kenneth Kaunda Children of Africa Foundation (KKCAF), an organisation addressing the HIV/Aids pandemic in Africa.
- SAPA