Kenneth David Buchizya Kaunda (born 28 April 1924), also known as KK, is a Zambian former politician who served as the first President of Zambia from 1964 to 1991.
He was born at Lubwa Mission in Chinsali, Northern Province of Northern Rhodesia, now Zambia.
He attended Munali Training Centre in Lusaka (August 1941 – 1943).
In April 1949, Kaunda returned to Lubwa to become a part-time teacher, but resigned in 1951.
In that year he became Organising Secretary of Northern Province’s Northern Rhodesian African National Congress.
On 11 November 1953 he moved to Lusaka to take up the post of Secretary General of the ANC, under the presidency of Harry Nkumbula.
In 1955 Kaunda and Nkumbula were imprisoned for two months with hard labour for distributing subversive literature; such imprisonment and other forms of harassment were normal rites of passage for African nationalist leaders.
Kaunda broke from the ANC and formed the Zambian African National Congress (ZANC) in October 1958.
ZANC was banned in March 1959. In June Kaunda was sentenced to nine months’ imprisonment, which he spent first in Lusaka, then in Salisbury.
Kaunda subsequently ran as a UNIP candidate during the 1962 elections.