Kwame Nkrumah

Across Africa and the diaspora Nkrumah is the founding prophet of Pan-Africanism, the man who led Ghana to independence in 1957 and helped found the Organisation of African Unity; a statue of him stands outside the African Union headquarters in Addis Ababa. In Ghana the memory is more divided. He made the country a one-party state, jailed opponents without trial, and was overthrown in a coup in 1966 that many Ghanaians celebrated. His rehabilitation at home came gradually, decades after his death.