Posted on 05/22/2013 12:08:05 PM PDT by Hotmetal
Its been a long time coming, but change is coming to Mississippi.
Former Ward 2 Councilman and Chokwe Lumumba, 65, (pronounced SHOW-kway Lu-MOOM-bah) is the winner of the mayoral primary runoff election in Jackson, Miss., reports WAPT.com.
Lumumba defeated business Jonathan Lee, 35, 54 percent to 46 percent with 100 percent of the vote reporting.
I think we just had a very difficult fight in order to win this office and we came out successful, Lumumba said from his victory party at the Clarion Hotel. Im very proud of all of the people in my campaign who worked so diligently and Im very proud of the people of Jackson because I think the people of Jackson have spoken and spoken very clearly.
Lumumba served four years on the Jackson City Council before running for mayor. He spent part of the 70s and 80s as vice-president of the Republic of New Afrika, an organization which advocated for an independent predominantly black government in the southeastern United States and reparations for slavery.
The provisional government of Republic of New Afrika was always a group that believed in human rights for human beings, Lumumba told The Associated Press in a recent interview. I think it has been miscast in many ways. It has never been any kind of racist group or hate white group in any way . It was a group which was fighting for human rights for black people in this country and at the same time supporting the human rights around the globe.
Read more from the Associated Press:
Lumumba was born in Detroit as Edwin Taliaferro, and changed his name in 1969, when he was in his early 20s. He said he took his new first name from an African tribe that resisted slavery centuries ago and his last name from African independence leader Patrice Lumumba. He moved to Jackson in 1971 as a human rights activist. He went to law school in Michigan in the mid-1970s and returned to Jackson in 1988.
During an April 30 debate, Lumumba carefully pronounced his name for the audience and said: Thats an African name. Like Barack Obama. Its not a Muslim name. Ive been a Christian all my life.
As an attorney, Lumumba has represented Tupac Shakur in several cases, including one in which the rapper was cleared of aggravated assault charges in the shootings of two off-duty police officers who were in Atlanta but from another city. Shakur died in 1996.
Lumumba persuaded then-Gov. Haley Barbour to release Jamie and Gladys Scott from prison in Mississippi in early 2011. The sisters served nearly 16 years for an armed robbery they said they didnt commit. Barbour, a Republican, was considering a run for the presidency at the time.
Lumumba also said on the City Council website that he helped defend former Black Panther heroine Assata Shakur, an aunt of Tupac Shakur. He represented her in 1977 in a murder case that was dismissed in New York, according to Lumumbas biography for a 2012 human rights conference. Also in 1977, Assata Shakur was sentenced to life in prison for the 1973 killing of a New Jersey state trooper. Lumumba said he was not involved in that case.
Lumumba will face 3 independent candidates in the June 4 general election.
And some people think the media is biased.
I’m glad I no longer live in Jackson.
Well Just Krap!
Looks to be quite a moderate fellow.
do I really have to add a /S tag
Well, I have few words fit for this forum.
He made sure to mention that his very nice, black family man opponent had the backing of the “Romney voters.”
Yeah, he’s real inclusive.
We live in N. MS., but I am SOglad that it is nowhere near Jackson. There must be beautiful parts because we know quite a few people from nice families in Jackson. It is crime central.
Jackson is self destructing.
We will never spend another dime there. It was already pretty close to that before. No eating out there since they passed that ridiculous entertainment tax. Sad to say we won’t be spending ANY money there on anything.
Sure hope the few businesses we supported will get a clue and move to Rankin or Madison county.
I live in NE MS also, Houston.
Dude is Black Ku Klux Klan Racist. And a Fascist
His adopted name was the name of a particularly vicious communist dictator of the Congo that the USA supported back in the 60s.
This must be a misprint...it's pronounced "pig fornicating knuckledragger".
Mississippi maybe Jackson will secede from the State ping.
One of my friends from Jackson was promoting the opponent vigorously on his Facebook. I have to say my friend is not a Romney voter. He’s always been a Democrat. I can only say that it was due to his parents. Maybe he will get a clue someday though I doubt it. It is so saddening to see what my hometown has become. What has happened was forecast when I was growing up. You could see the Chicago and Detroit influence creeping into certain areas.
Glad you are back home. I was in Houston over the weekend. Drove down Friday in heavy rain from here to hwy 32. On the way home yesterday I had to come to a complete stop on the Trace to let a turkey cross the road. First time that had ever happened.
Guy doesn’t look “authentically black” to me....
Thanks MamaB.The Traace is covered with turkey and deer, I hardly ever go that route anymore.
words fail .. spit still works
Full circle. Coleman Young was a Southern transplant who came to Detroit and does a crap job. Now this clown comes from Detroit to the South and will do a crap job there.
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