Norbert Zongo was born in the Koudougou region, French Upper Volta on 31 July 1949 into the Gnougnoossi family, a prominent subset of the Mossi people. While in secondary school in 1964, he created a newspaper, "La Voix du Cours Normal", writing bulletins on his exercise sheets with information gleaned from morning broadcasts from Radio France Internationale, BBC World Service, and other international radio stations. School officials eventually banned his publication after it discussed political topics. After high school, Zongo pursued legal studies at University of Abidjan in Côte d'Ivoire and journalism at the University of Benin in Togo. The latter university expelled him and he was imprisoned in Burkina Faso after Zongo published his political novel "Le Parachutage". He was able to finish his education in journalism at the University of Yaoundé in Cameroon.