myzimbabweonline
Sign inJoin
All ZimbabweChange location

Zimbabwe Hall of Fame

The people who shaped Zimbabwe — what they did, and why they are remembered here. Every entry carries the sources it was written from.

Everyone here earned a place. The four levels say how far the reach went — from a contribution worth recording, up to a life without which the country’s story does not hold together. It is an editorial judgement, not an official ranking, and it is not fixed: people move up as achievements accumulate, and a placement can be reconsidered. Tell us who is missing.

Arrange by Level Profession

Statecraft & Independence

Joshua Nkomo 1917 – 1999

Founder of ZAPU and Father Zimbabwe

Peerless
Joice Mujuru born 1955

Guerrilla fighter at sixteen, cabinet minister at twenty-five, vice-president at forty-nine

Landmark
Oppah Muchinguri born 1958

Zimbabwe's Minister of Defence

Distinguished
Herbert Chitepo 1923 – 1975

Zimbabwe's first Black barrister, and ZANU's national chairman

Landmark
Josiah Tongogara 1938 – 1979

Commander of ZANLA, dead weeks before independence

Landmark
Victoria Chitepo 1928 – 2016

Campaigner and minister in independent Zimbabwe

Distinguished

Diplomacy & Public Service

Arikana Chihombori-Quao

The African Union's ambassador to Washington, and its sharpest public voice on colonialism

Landmark

Literature & Ideas

Doris Lessing 1919 – 2013

Nobel Prize in Literature, 2007

Peerless
Tsitsi Dangarembga born 1959

Author of Nervous Conditions

Distinguished
Charles Mungoshi 1947 – 2019

Twice a PEN International award winner, writing in Shona and English

Landmark
Dambudzo Marechera 1952 – 1987

The House of Hunger, and the Guardian Fiction Prize

Landmark
Yvonne Vera 1964 – 2005

Novelist of the silences in Zimbabwe's history

Landmark
Chenjerai Hove 1956 – 2015

Novelist and poet in both English and Shona

Landmark
Shimmer Chinodya born 1957

Commonwealth Writers' Prize for Africa, 1990

Distinguished
Solomon Mutswairo 1924 – 2005

Wrote the first novel in Shona

Landmark
NoViolet Bulawayo born 1981

The first woman shortlisted for the Booker with each of her first two novels

Landmark

Art, Design & Fashion

Joseph Ndandarika 1940 – 1991

One of the founders of Zimbabwean stone sculpture

Landmark
Nicholas Mukomberanwa 1940 – 2002

The most distinctive of Zimbabwe's stone sculptors

Landmark
Dominic Benhura born 1968

Self-taught sculptor, national prize-winner at eighteen

Distinguished

Music

Oliver Mtukudzi 1952 – 2019

Tuku — Zimbabwe's most loved musician

Distinguished
Thomas Mapfumo born 1945

The Lion of Zimbabwe, and the inventor of chimurenga music

Landmark
Alick Macheso born 1968

Simbaradzo, the best-selling album in Zimbabwean history

Landmark
Jah Prayzah

The most played musician in Zimbabwe

Distinguished
Winky D

Dancehall Igwe, and the voice of Zimbabwean dancehall

Distinguished
Leonard Dembo 1959 – 1996

Chitekete, and the mastery of sungura

Landmark
Simon Chimbetu 1955 – 2005

The father of dendera music

Landmark
Stella Chiweshe 1946 – 2023

The mbira queen, who learned an instrument women were not permitted to play

Landmark
The Bhundu Boys

Jit, and the band that carried Zimbabwe to British audiences

Distinguished
Charles Charamba born 1971

Zimbabwe's best-selling gospel artist for two decades

Landmark
Olivia Charamba

Half of Zimbabwe's First Family of Gospel

Distinguished
Holy Ten born 1998

The leading voice of Zimbabwean hip hop

Household Name
Nutty O

Zimdancehall singer and songwriter

Household Name
Chiwoniso Maraire 1976 – 2013

Took up the mbira, which women were not supposed to play, and took it worldwide

Landmark
Lovemore Majaivana born 1954

The most prominent Ndebele musician Zimbabwe has produced

Landmark

Film & Stage

Danai Gurira born 1978

Okoye and Michonne — and the playwright behind Eclipsed

Landmark
Jesesi Mungoshi

The title role in Neria

Distinguished

Media & Journalism

Trevor Ncube born 1962

Publisher who kept an independent press alive under Mugabe

Landmark
Geoffrey Nyarota 1951 – 2025

Broke Willowgate, and founded the paper that outsold the state's

Landmark
Edna Machirori

The first Black woman to edit a mainstream Zimbabwean newspaper

Landmark

Sport

Kirsty Coventry born 1983

Zimbabwe's most decorated Olympian

Distinguished
Nick Price born 1957

Three major championships and world number one

Landmark
Henry Olonga born 1976

Zimbabwe's first Black cricketer, and the black armband protest

Landmark
Andy Flower born 1968

Zimbabwe's finest batsman, later a championship-winning coach

Distinguished

Business & Enterprise

Strive Masiyiwa born 1961

Founded Econet after a five-year court fight with the state

Landmark
Divine Ndhlukula born 1960

Built Zimbabwe's largest security firm from a cottage at her house

Landmark

Science, Medicine & Engineering

Tererai Trent born 1965

Married at eleven, and went on to a doctorate and a foundation

Landmark
Sikhulile Moyo

His lab was the first in the world to identify the Omicron variant

Landmark
Madeline Nyamwanza-Makonese

The first Zimbabwean woman doctor

Landmark
Bothwell Mbuwayesango

Led the all-Zimbabwean team that separated conjoined twins

Distinguished
Collen Masimirembwa born 1967

Pharmacogenetics of African populations

Distinguished

Faith & Community

Mbuya Nehanda c. 1840 – 1898

Led the First Chimurenga, and promised her bones would rise

Peerless
Ezekiel Guti 1923 – 2023

Founded ZAOGA under a gum tree, and grew it to three million members

Landmark

Know someone who belongs here?

This is an editorial selection, and it is certainly incomplete. Tell us who is missing from Zimbabwe and why — an editor reads every suggestion.

This is an editorial selection, not an official register. If you think someone is missing or something is wrong, let us know.