About Callistus Ndlovu
Callistus Dingiswayo Ndlovu (9 February 1936 – 13 February 2019) was a Zimbabwean academic, diplomat, and politician. He joined the Zimbabwe African People's Union (ZAPU) in 1963 as a teacher in Matabeleland, and went on to serve as its representative to the United Nations and North America in the 1970s. After Zimbabwe's independence in 1980, he was a member of the House of Assembly from 1980 to 1985 and served as a senator from 1985 to 1990. He left ZAPU and joined the ruling ZANU–PF party in 1984. Ndlovu held several portfolios in Prime Minister Robert Mugabe's cabinet in the 1980s, serving as Minister of Construction from 1982 to 1984, Minister of Mines from 1984 to 1985, and Minister of Industry and Technology between 1985 and 1989. In 1989, he was implicated in the Willowgate corruption scandal and resigned from the cabinet after being accused of lying to the official panel investigating the allegations. He ran unsuccessfully for Parliament in 2000 and again for the Senate in 2013, and served on the ZANU–PF Central Committee and as the party's provincial chairman for Bulawayo. He died in 2019 in South Africa, where he was being treated for cancer. In 1960, Ndlovu joined the National Democratic Party, an African nationalist party founded by Joshua Nkomo. In 2013, he won the ZANU–PF primary in the Khumalo constituency, and was included on the party list of Senate candidates in Bulawayo. That year, Ndlovu became ZANU's provincial chairman for Bulawayo, an office he held until 1987.
Biography source: Wikipedia. The profile adds birthday-specific historical context from the Celebs Birthday Today editorial database.