RPCV Elaine Jones mentioned as candidate to succeed Mfume as NAACP head



RPCV Elaine Jones mentioned as candidate to succeed Mfume as NAACP head

S.C.’s NAACP leaders praise Mfume’s contributions

By RODDIE BURRIS

Staff Writer

In South Carolina, NAACP leaders Tuesday hailed Kweisi Mfume’s tenure as head of the nation’s largest civil rights group as effective and forward-looking.

“There was progress made under his leadership,” said Lonnie Randolph, NAACP state president.

“He said that it was time for him to move on — that he wanted to consider some other opportunities in life, and I respect his decision to do that. He did the right thing.”

Randolph said a South Carolinian, Nelson Rivers, has been mentioned as Mfume’s successor.

Randolph also mentioned former NAACP legal counsel Elaine Jones and Washington, D.C.-branch president Hillary Shelton as strong candidates.

Mfume named Rivers, a 53-year-old Bennett’s Point native, as the NAACP’s chief operating officer in 2002.

Randolph said the NAACP should name “the best person they can possibly find” to address lingering civil rights concerns, including racial and gender discrimination, and racially disparate education, health care and pay. “Race is still a major, major problem in this country.”

Mfume spoke at the State House in Columbia during the 2000 Martin Luther King Jr. Day celebration. That rally drew nearly 50,000 marchers — one of the state’s largest demonstrations — to urge lawmakers to remove the Confederate flag from the State House.

Mfume also led the NAACP when it voted later that year to establish economic sanctions against South Carolina’s tourism industry over the flag issue.

“I was sorry to hear about his resignation, sorry to see him go,” said the Rev. Joseph Darby of Charleston, first vice president of the state NAACP. “He did a very good job.”

Darby said Mfume was the right leader for the NAACP at a critical time. “Our image was hurting,” he said, referring to sex and financial scandals that plagued the organization before Mfume took over.

Darby said Mfume stabilized the NAACP.

When this story was posted in November 2004, this was on the front page of PCOL:

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