Canaan Sodindo Banana was a Zimbabwean Methodist minister, theologian, and politician. He served as the first President of Zimbabwe from 1980 to 1987. In 1997, Banana was accused of being a homosexual, and after a highly publicised trial, was convicted of 11 counts of sodomy and serving six months in prison. He died of cancer in 2003, with sources varying on his place of death.
About Canaan Banana in brief
Canaan Sodindo Banana was a Zimbabwean Methodist minister, theologian, and politician. He served as the first President of Zimbabwe from 1980 to 1987. In 1997, Banana was accused of being a homosexual, and after a highly publicised trial, was convicted of 11 counts of sodomy and serving six months in prison. He died of cancer in 2003, with sources varying on his place of death. After his death, Robert Mugabe called him a ‘rare gift to the nation’ He was born in Essexvale, Matabeleland, Southern Rhodesia, to an Ndebele mother and a Mosotho father. He was ordained a United Methodist minister in 1962. In 1969, he was elected Chairman of the Bulawayo Council of Churches, an office he held until 1971. He became involved in anti-colonial politics, embracing black liberation theology and criticising the Rhodesian government under Ian Smith, which had declared the country independent under white-minority rule in 1965. In the 1960s and 1970s, he preached from the Gospel to the Ghetto, The Gospel According to Canaan Banana — The Gospel of Canaan Banana.
He also wrote a book, Canaan Banana: An Autobiography, in which he describes his experiences as a black Zimbabwean in the 1950s and 1960s. In 1998, he served six months of a seven-year prison sentence for sodomy, attempted Sodomy and indecent assault, and was also defrocked. In 1999, he published a book about his experiences, The Ghetto Ghetto: A Memoir of a Black Zimbabwean In the 1970s and 1980s. He is survived by his wife, the former ZANU-PF Vice-President, and his son, the current Prime Minister of Zimbabwe, Robert M. Mugabe, who is also a former President of the Zimbabwean National Party (ZANU–PF). He died in 2003 in Harare, Zimbabwe, after a long battle with cancer. His son, Robert, is now the prime minister of Zimbabwe and the leader of the African National Congress (ANC)
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