Thirty-five years after performing at the first Independence Day celebrations of Zimbabwe, Jamaican reggae icon Bob Marley will be posthumously honored at the annual Zimbabwe Music Awards (ZIMA) on a date to be announced.
According to the website www.chronicle.co.zw, Marley will be bestowed a Lifetime Achievement Award.
ZIMA Chairman Joseph Nyadzayo said the award is in tribute to Marley, years after he performed at the flag-raising ceremony in 1980.
“We’re honoring him for giving the de facto anthem and for leading the reggae music revolution in our free nation which as influenced important music types such as our own Zimdancehall phenomenon,” he was quoted as saying.
Marley penned the single Zimbabwe, taken from his 1979 album Survival, in support of the country’s (then Rhodesia) independence.
“As the Marley family comes to Zimbabwe, we hope to recreate some of the excitement that we felt years ago when our nation was born,” Nyadzayo continued.
Marley died in May 1981 of cancer. He was 36.
— By Richard Johnson
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