Augusta focus. ([Augusta, Ga.) 198?-current, January 05, 1995, Image 2

Augusta focus., January 05, 1995, Page 2, Image 2

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Newspaper Page Text2 January 5, 1995 AUGUSTA FOCUS Chicago hosts Ghanaian dignitary M Nation of Islam receives and thanks First Lady of Ghana for successful African convention by J. Hunter Special to Augusta Focus Chicago, IL Mrs. Khadijah Farrakhan, wife of Nation of Islam leader Minis ter Louis Farrakhan, hosted a reception for the First Lady of Ghana, Mrs. Nana Rawlings. The purpose of the reception was to welcome Mrs. Rawlings and thank the people of Ghana for hosting the Nation of Islam (NOI) at their first Saviour’s Day Con vention held on the African Con tinent. While in Chicago, Mayor Rich ard Daley received Mrs. Rawlings at city hall and pre sented her with a key to the City. This was Mrs. Rawlings’ first visit to America, where she met com munity leaders in cities around the country. She invited and en couraged African-American trade delegates to visit Ghana to explore investment possibilities. An estimated audience of 10 million watched NOI leader Min ister Louis Farrakhan deliver his address, aired live on Ghanaian TV and via satellite to 23 U.S. cities, Canada and the Carib bean. This Convention in Africa sig naled the fulfillment of the NOI founder, the Hon. Elijah King Center dispute sparks accusations of profiteering From page one “So we're going to fight for that.” King’s widow, Coretta Scott King, has been a zealous guard ianofher husband’s history, charg ing fees to those who publish his speeches and unsuccessfully su ing Boston University a few years ago over the ownership of per sonal papers King gave to the school in 1964. She has accused the federal gov ernment of trying to usurp the family’s role in preserving her husband’s work. But that position has isolated thefamilyin a city where the King name adorns streets, buildings and schools, and where the his toric Auburn Avenue district where he lived and planned some of the great events of the civil rights movement is the top tourist attraction. Residents of the neighborhood, where the park service presence is credited for some redevelop ment, have for the most part sided Don’t Pay Too Much For Car Insurance! I= S F S é@@!@ - =N, Low Rates Easy Payments Call Today! ORDA 706) 722-9444 vﬁ‘ a‘e 45g Broad )Street-Old Towne Plaza AUTO (Across from Days Inn) (706) 790-4381 | s <y : “'- "“ ->-4 :l‘ 4 Y g’ i« % R é‘ ,~ g¥‘ﬁ? §- - » S ; 7’ ‘ o 1 2 g | » TR ; e \'\\"l“.\\ ) XN P v L 7 \ w x o ot y > ‘l. =t 'V 'y k! Le g N , y ~§'r‘k’ - ‘Q’ ‘: - N " ' 3 SSS 4 ("‘ b W e Khadijah Farrakhan (L), and Chicago Mayor Richard Daley present Nana Rawlings, First Lady of Ghana (R) with key to city. Muhammad, who wanted to build a bridge between Africa and Africans in the Diaspora. To an estimated 40,000 at Accra’s (Ghana) Independence Square, Farrakhan said, “Africa has the potential to be a great super power in the 21st century ... but we have to envision it.” Farrakhansaid that visions have tobe “shed” and Africans have to take on a “new idea that will bring us a new vision, then we will ultimately evolve into Ghana’s former president, Kwame Nkrumah’s vision of a United States of Africa.” The convention included work shops on topics like Economic Development, The Business Con nection, Toward Understanding Africans in the Diaspora, The Changing Role of the African Women, and Health Issues Fac against the Kings. Even Joseph L. Roberts Jr., the current pastor at Ebenezer Bap tist Church, where King preached, has accused the family of being “dictatorial” and motivated too much by profit. Rep. John Lewis, D-Atlanta, a civil rights leader and King aide in the 19605, said it has been ex tremely painful to find himself at odds with Mrs. King. He has set a Jan. 21 meeting to bring the two sides together. But he was the chief congressional backer of the park service project and vows it won't be derailed. “The legacy of Dr. King belongs not just to the King site or the King family. Dr. King was a citi zen of the world and we must not forget that. His legacy should not be bought and sold like a box of soap,” Lewis said. The family-run King Center has had a history of managerial prob lems, and has been often criti cized for paying too little atten tion to problems such as poverty, World News ing the Black World. Workshop presenters included Tynetta Muhammad, wife of Elijah Muhammad; Kwame Toure (Stokely Carmichael); syndicated talk show host Bob Law; Tony Annat Forson, of the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation; Chief Executive Officer of Third World Press, Haki Madhubuti; Dr. Na’im Akbar, executive director of Mind Productions; and Dr. David Dubois, son of W.E.B. Dubois. “The convention served a po litical and cultural purpose in the sensethat it demonstrated ... the interactive possibilities for Africans and African Americans,” Dr. Akbar said. “Spiritually, it demonstrated the realization of a vision that was established a long time ago in the works and the efforts of the H.E.M.” said King biographer David Garrow. : “It’s crucial for us to separate the Kinglegacy from what Coretta and the children have done and are doing, which I think there’s nothing else to call it other than utterly self-destructive,” said Garrow, whose 1986 book on King, “Bearing the Cross,” won the Pulitzer Prize. “The whole thing is incredibly sad, but not particularly surpris ing,” said Garrow, a history pro fessor at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Va. If few Atlanta residents or offi cials are rising to defend the family’s position now, the Kings got empathy from some tourists visiting the historic site as the battle raged last week. “I don’t consider it profiteering. The man did something, and they want to take advantage of it,” said Charmaine Crabb ofg Columbus, Ga. “That’s part of America. If the King family can profit, let them do it" International representative for the NOI, Akbar Muhammad, who hosted the convention, said that the people of Ghana were “overwhelmed” by what they saw. He described the Convention as “historical.” He feels that the events should be documented “for our children and our children’s children.” According to Muhammad, some of the partici pating scholars said that they would capture the workshops and publish some of the results. During the Opening Session, President Jerry Rawlings of Ghana called the event “a pil grimage for Africans in the Diaspora,” and discussed how whites have used religion to in still European values. “If you want to Christianize me go ahead, but don’t Europeanize me, don’t take away my identity,” he said to a standing ovation from an audience that included his entire cabinet as conference del egates. Farrakhan left Africa pledg ing to build a Mosque school and officein Ghana’s Muslim district of Nima, in Accra. The NOI has a community of over 40 members in Nima, which is outside of Accra. Minister Akbar Muhammad will assist in organizing trade and travel delegations to Ghana. For additional information, please write Minister Akbar Muhammad at P.O. Box 01241, Osu-Accra Ghana, West Africa or in the United States at 8816 Manchester Rd. Suite #ll7 St. L0ui5M0.63144(314)962-2117. HELP ¢ *SLOW CREDIT*NO CREDIT *BANKRUPTCY*DIVORCE *REPOSSESSION " WE LISTEN & CAN HELP! CALL JIM DAVIS ON OUR CREDIT HOTLINE TODAY! 731-9000 Program Cars Available & Over 8 $2 Million Used Car Inventory (- g TRN k Of Augusta 1 BLOCK WEST OF REGENCY MALL, GORDON HIGHWAY In new South Africa, line blurs between township and town By Donna Bryson Associated Press Writer JOHANNESBURG, South Africa The line between black township and whitetown isblurring. There’s a sleek mall in black Sowetoand a funky African “shebeen” in one of Johannesburg’s wealthy white neighborhoods. South Africa’s white areas are dotted with elaborate, multistory monuments to consumerism. But shopping in townships often meant dilapidated corner stores or bleak strip centers. That is, until Dobsonville Mall opened in Soweto in September. Dobsonville is bright, tiled and full of cruising teens dressed to be seen in the latest baggy shorts and American-style baseball caps. Upscaleboutiquesonce found only in white areas, jewelry stores of fering SSOO gold chains, and an aerobics studio have moved in. Corrie Baehae, window-shop ping with her mother one morn ing, said mall developers should have realized long ago there was money to be made in Soweto. The black community southwest of Johannesburg has shacks and squatter camps, but it also has mansions and even a BMW dealership. “We like nice things — it’s just that we were denied them,” said Baehae, a 23-year-old law stu dent who has lived in Soweto all her life. In town, whites are getting a taste of shebeens, the lively, unli censed bars that had their heyday in the 19505. Modern shebeens in the town ships are often little more than a kitchen where beer and cigarettes are sold. The Get Ahead Shebeen, which opened in Johannesburg last March, tries to recapture the glamor of the days whenbigbands and crooners kept people dancing and shebeen queens kept their tin cups full of homemade beer. Get Ahead decorated its space in a chic mall with pieces of corru gated iron and a mural of a shack settlement spread out under a sky darkened by coal smoke. Crowds at cases and restaurants elsewhere inthe mall were almost all white one recent evening, but Get Ahead was packed with blacks drawn from a growing black ur ban and suburban population. A few whites also took the floor, while polo-shirted young white men stood in a corner like wall flowers at the prom. J.P. Kalala, who is black, said he frequents Get Ahead for the live music, ranging from reggae bands to the African Jazz Pioneers, who offer bouncy, brass-driven nostal gia. Dolly Ngubane, the 64-year-old hostess who brings Get Ahead a touch of authenticity with her memories of real shebeens, insists it'’s more thanjust a place todance — it’s a symbol of the new South Africa. “We are all together — black, white, colored.” she said. “De mocracy! Now everybody’s happy.”