14 Facts About Fay Chung

Fay King Chung was born on March 1941 and is a Zimbabwean educator and was an independent candidate for the 2008 Zimbabwean senatorial election.

Fay Chung was born in the British self-governing colony of Southern Rhodesia, the third generation of a Chinese immigrant family.

Fay Chung's father was a successful businessman called Chu Yao Chung.

Fay Chung's mother, Nguk Sim Lee, was a Chinese-trained nurse who emigrated to Rhodesia to get married.

Fay Chung died whilst giving birth when Fay Chung was only three years old.

Fay Chung grew up in a Roman Catholic Chinese family in Rhodesia in the 1950s and trained as an educator at the University of Rhodesia and in 1968 went on to earn her postgraduate degree in education and a masters in philosophy in English literature at the University of Leeds.

Fay Chung attended the Indian and Asian primary school called Louis Mountbatten, named after the British Viceroy of India.

Fay Chung was Deputy Secretary for Administration in the Ministry of Education from 1980 to 1988 and Minister of Education in President Robert Mugabe's cabinet from 1988 to 1993.

Fay Chung co-founded the Zimbabwe Foundation for Education with Production, a non-governmental organisation that combined education with agricultural production theory to assist war veterans and their families and was appointed Deputy Minister of Administration of the Ministry of Education at Zimbabwe's independence in 1980.

Fay Chung was appointed Minister of Education by Mugabe in 1988.

Fay Chung resigned from the Ministry of Education after disagreeing with the government.

Fay Chung returned home to Zimbabwe in 2003 ostensibly to retire, though she has continued to be outspoken on Zimbabwean politics.

Fay Chung is a founder of the Forum for African Women Educationalists, the Association for Strengthening Higher Education for Women in Africa and is the chairperson of the board of trustees of the Women's University in Africa which she helped co-found in 2003.

Fay Chung was one of the early public supporters of independent presidential candidate, Simba Makoni, who announced his presidential candidacy in early February 2008.