Kandake Amanirenas was a queen of the ancient African Kingdom of Kush who was best known for skillfully defending her kingdom against the armies of the Roman Empire. Amanirenas was probably born between 60 and 50 B.C. and was the second of the eight Kandakes … Read MoreKandake Amanirenas (?-10 BC)
Jacob Zuma is the 4th president of post-apartheid South Africa and a member of the African National Congress (ANC). He held the presidency for nine years from 2009 to 2018 until he was ousted under a shroud of scandals and corruption. Before his presidency, Zuma worked with other African nationalists … Read MoreJacob Gedleyihlekisa Zuma (1942– )
“Prime Minister Forbes Burnham and President Lyndon B. Johnson, The White House, July 21, 1966” Linden Forbes Sampson Burnham, Prime Minister of Guyana from 1966 to 1980 and then President of the nation from 1980 to 1985, was one of the Caribbean region’s most controversial … Read MoreForbes Burnham (1923–1985)
Statue of St. Maurice c. 1240-1250, Magdeburg Cathedral of St. Maurice and St. Catherine, Author Unknown, Pictures @ 1979 Menil Foundation, Houston, Texas Image Courtesy of the Menil Foundation St. Maurice is commemorated throughout churches in modern Germany as a black African dressed as a … Read MoreSt. Maurice (ca. 250-ca. 287)
Muammar al-Qaddafi has been Libyan head of state since 1969 and one of the most controversial and divisive leaders in the Middle East and Africa in the twentieth century. Qaddafi was born in the spring of 1942 to an Arabized Berber family near the Sirt … Read MoreMuammar Al-Qaddafi (1942-2011)
Nanny, known as Granny Nanny, Grandy Nanny, and Queen Nanny was a Maroon leader and Obeah woman in Jamaica during the late 17th and early 18th centuries. Maroons were slaves in the Americas who escaped and formed independent settlements. Nanny herself was an escaped slave … Read MoreQueen Nanny of the Maroons (? – 1733)
Image Ownership: Public Domain On February 7, 2008, Belize elected Dean Barrow as its first black Prime Minister. Born March 2, 1951, in Belize City, Barrow earned his LL.M. from the University of Miami in the United States and became partner at a Belizean law … Read MoreDean Oliver Barrow (1951- )
Map of the Sultanate of Sokoto Image Ownership: Public Domain Islamic preacher, reformer, scholar, and statesman, Usman dan Fodio was born on December 15, 1754 in the village of Maratta, in the Hausa city-state of Gobir, in what is today northern Nigeria. He was a … Read MoreUsman dan Fodio (1754-1817)
Samora Machel, first president of independent Mozambique, was born on September 29, 1933 in the village of Chilembene, in the Gaza Province of Mozambique. He was of the Shangana ethnic group and was born into a family of farmers. Machel attended a Catholic mission school … Read MoreSamora Moises Machel (1933-1986)
Image Ownership: Public Domain Joseph Kasavubu was the first president of the Republic of Congo, serving from 1960 to 1965. He assumed the office when the Congo became independent from Belgium on June 30, 1960. The date and year of his birth is not certain … Read MoreJoseph Kasavubu (ca. 1910- 1969)