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| Mfume rebukes Durham NAACP chapter |
| 2001-09-19 |
National NAACP President Kweisi Mfume sternly rebuked Durham NAACP President Curtis Gatewood Tuesday for the local minister's recent controversial comments regarding last week's terrorist attacks. Local and state NAACP members also condemned Gatewood's statement, in which he criticized President Bush and called World Trade Center companies discriminatory, while calling for a nonviolent response to the attacks. Meanwhile, City Council candidate Michael Peterson responded to the comments by withdrawing from the organization's upcoming candidates' forum. "Mr. Gatewood surely has a right to his beliefs, but they are not the beliefs of the NAACP," Mfume said in a telephone interview with The Herald-Sun from his Baltimore office. "And while we live in a society where there are problems and imperfections, at this time of war it's important to keep our priorities straight and focused. This is not a time to sit back and pontificate with pointed fingers about the fact that there are imperfections in our society. This is a time to find a way as Americans -- without the hyphen -- to work together to protect our way of life and the lives of innocent people." In his statement, Gatewood called for the United States to refrain from retaliating against the attacks, a position that he said reflects the NAACP's nonviolent, spiritual and cultural roots. Gatewood went on to say that black Americans should listen to God and not to the "nation's arrogant calls for blind patriotism, retaliation and hatred." |
| Posted by:Fred Pruitt |