From Humble beginnings

Chief Tendai of Manyika Land, recognizing that his people needed to learn new skills, granted land and mining rights during the late 1800s to Cecil Rhodes in exchange for guns and educational opportunities.

In 1898, Joseph Crane Hartzell, a Methodist bishop, stood on Chiremba Mountain above Old Mutare, Zimbabwe, (then called Old Umtali in rural Rhodesia), and looking down into the valley that is now home to Africa University envisioned hundreds of African young people with books in their hands, running to school.

Hartzell shared his dream with Rhodes and was granted a large tract of land at the base of Chiremba Mountain. This land was part of the original grant Rhodes received from Chief Tendai and had been, for a brief period, the settler town of Umtali. On that land, the United Methodist Church developed schools, an orphanage and a small hospital to serve the needs of the African people.

The proposal for a church-related university first came from bishops of the United Methodist Church (UMC) in Africa. In 1984, two African bishops, Emilio J. M. De Carvalho of Angola and Arthur Kulah of Liberia, issued the call to create Africa University. Increased access to higher education was key, they said, to peace, stability and development in Africa.

Out of that challenge came the Africa University Initiative - regional consultations about educational and vocational needs, planning and site selection efforts - around the founding of the institution.

Prompted by United Methodist plans to establish a continent-wide university in Zimbabwe where no private universities existed, President Robert Mugabe formed a government commission in 1987 to study the country's higher education needs and to make recommendations on the role of private universities in the nation's overall education scheme.

When the proposal calling for the establishment of Africa University in Zimbabwe went before the worldwide church at the United Methodist Church's General Conference in 1988, it fired imaginations. The General Conference approved the founding of an institution to serve all of Africa funded primarily by UMC congregations in the USA.

On April 6, 1991, thousands of people gathered at Old Mutare, on a site comprising 1545 acres of land donated by the United Methodist Church in Zimbabwe, for the groundbreaking ceremony.

In January 1992, President Robert Mugabe granted Africa University's Charter by official proclamation. Farm buildings on the University site were quickly refurbished to serve as teaching facilities. By March 1992, classes had started with 40 students from a dozen Africa countries studying in two faculties - Agriculture & Natural Resources and Theology.

In 1993, twenty-five new students were enrolled. The process of fine-tuning programmes continued with the addition of more faculty members and the University Farm, offering students hands-on experience and practical training.

Over the past decade, the pace of academic and physical development at Africa University has been phenomenal. Refurbished farm buildings gave way to modern teaching facilities, residence halls and a student services unit with the official opening of the University by President Robert Mugabe in April 1994.

In the 2001/2002 the University enrolment was 793 full time students from African 22 countries" (Angola, Botswana, Brazil, Burundi, Cameroon, Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Lesotho, Liberia, Malawi, Mozambique, Nigeria, Portugal, Rwanda, Swaziland, Sierra Leone, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe).

Two faculties-Health Sciences and Technology-are still to be developed. Work on the launch of the Faculty of Medical Sciences is quite advanced.