Soft drink titans eye a new prize: ethnic markets/Page 7A
i Oe Charlotte l^ost
APRIL 25,1996
75 CENTS
Greetings from the Motherland
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PHOTO/ PAUL WILLIAMS I
U.S. Rep. Mel Watt of Charlotte shares a handshake and embrace with Nana Boakye Ansah Debrah, sub-chief to the king of
the Ashanti people, during a reception for the Kumasi, Ghanl delegation. The delegates were in Chariotte this week as part
of the Sister Citiy exchange program.
Ghana delegation gets first-hand look at sister city
By Tammie Tolbert
THE CHARLOTTE POST
Business and civic leaders from
Charlotte’s sister city in Africa are here
to observe how its American counter
part operates.
On Sunday, there was a welcome
reception, held for delegates from
Kumasi, Ghana. Local, state and
national political leaders, including
U.S. Reps. Mel Watt (D-N.C.) and
Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) and gubernor-
torial candidate and former Charlotte
Mayor Richard Vinroot were at the
reception along with business and com
munity leaders.
The business leaders met with the
Kumasi delegates to discuss possibili
ties of conducting international busi
ness between the two cities.
The Ghana contingent has been
exposed to everything from city plan
ning to education to food processing and
preservation.
“The purpose of having the delegates
in Charlotte is because we want to
establish and build upon the economic
and educational ties that we began with
Kumasi in August of 1995,” said Peggy
Wesp, director of Charlotte's Sister
City Committee. “There are 18 dele
gates and nine of the delegates are
business people, while the remaining
See GHANA on page 6A
Fight for what’s right,
Maxine Waters says
Wi
K~
By Tammie Tolbert
THE CHARLOTTE POST
’ . i
PHOTO/PAUL WILLIAMS I
U.S. Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) says African Americans have
to fight for their rights as American politics gets conservative.
Congresswoman Maxine
Waters encourages African
Americans to stand up and
fight for the rights that have
been afforded by affirmative
action and voting rights.
“It was the fights and the
struggles of the 1940s, ‘50s
and ‘60s that opened the doors
for so many of us to walk
through and it will be the
fights of tomorrow that will
keep these doors open,”
Waters said last week during
Thompson
civil suit set
for August
City of Charlotte and officer are plaintiffs
in connection with 1994 shooting fatality
By John Minter
THE CHARLOTTE POST
Windy Gail Thompson's last words were apparently “No, I'm
not getting out.”
She said those words three times before she
was shot and killed by Charlotte-Mecklenburg
police officer Mark Farmer, according to
Farmer’s statements after the Dec. 29, 1994
shooting.
That account and statements by three witness
es to the shooting are contained in court docu
ments for a civil lawsuit filed on behalf of
Thompson's estate and her two children.
The trial is currently set for the Aug. 3 term of
federal district court, with U.S. District Court
Judge Robert Potter presiding. Thompson
The lawsuit was filed in state court, but attor
neys for Farmer and the city of Charlotte, joint defendents in the
action, had it moved to federal court.
The case was originally on the docket for trial in March, but
was delayed because of overcrowding.
The defense team also declined an opportunity to try the case
sooner before a U.S. magistrate.
Potter, appointed during the Reagan administration, is viewed
as conservative and has earned a reputation as “Maximum Bob”
for his tough sentencing of those convicted in his court.
According to depositions and other documents in the Thompson
file, the plaintiffs’ case alleges Farmer was not in danger when
See THOMPSON on page 3A
List of supeiintendent finalists
list includes African American
By John Minter
THE CHARLOTTE POST
a speech at the NAACP Legal
Defense and Education Fund
dinner in Charlotte.
Since its founding in 1940,
the NAACP LDF has led
many of the struggles by tak
ing on and winning court
cases' that directly affect
African Americans.
“This marks the 100th
anniversary of Plessy versus
Ferguson where the Supreme
Court sanctioned separate but
equal and gave the green light
to Jim Crow laws,” Waters
See WATERS on page 3A
Charlotte will get its first
look at four prospective
schools superintendent candi
dates next week.
One of the four candidates,
Kenneth Burnley of Colorado
Springs, Colo., is African
American. One is a woman,
Cheryl WTlhoyte of Madison,
Wis.
The other candidates are
Eric Smith of Newport News,
Va. and Patrick Russo of
Savannah, Ga.
Missing from the school
board's short list is Dennis
Williams, who became assis
tant superintendent to John
Murphy last year and has
served as acting superinten
dent for instruction since
Murphy resigned in
December. Williams, 33, had
expressed interest in the top
job, but had no previous expe
rience in that capacity.
Smith and Russo have
extensive experience in school
systems in which African
American students are in the
majority or are near! , u.i jiur
cent of the enrollment.
Russo's Savannah-Chatham
County Public Schools 38,000
pupil enrollment is 64 percent
minority. Smith's Newport
News Public Schools’ 32,000
student enrollment is 53 per
cent minority. '
School board members sai/'
they selected candidates based
on proven achievemeni n
raising test scores aiid lealing
with discipline pr/ '■•ii-mf.
Smith, for exa..' r.Hu an
eight-month police oudorcover
operation in the Newport
News system and no puns
have been found in his «-Soolb
for the pa.st two years.
Russo, Georgia's 1995 super
intendent of the year, has
developed magnet schools and
tech prep initiatives and
employs the “effective schools”
approach.
Wilhoyte's Madison
Metropolitan School District
has some of the highest test
scores in the nation and pro
duced 47 National Merit final
ists last year, more than 23
times the norm for a district
See SEARCH on page 3A
International students learn more about America at JCSU
By Josephine George
THE CHARLOTTE POST
Mgimo University and Obirin University aren’t household
names in these parts, but they’re not foreign at Johnson C.
Smith University.
They’re schools in Russia and Japan and part of the
International Studies program at Smith, which gives foreign stu
dents the chance to learn more about America and its people. In
return, American students are sent abroad.
Students from Mgimo (Russia) and Obirin were picked by deans
at their universities to spend a minimum of One semester at the
historically black campus. Seven international students are in
the foreign exchange program to see American culture first-hand
and learn more about the U.S. than what they get from media
back home.
“They recommended me a full scholarship and I passed certain
criteria,” says senior Fumiko Shimizu.
'This is the students’ last semester at JCSU. They are studying
basic courses - math, rhetoric and liberal studies - plus econom
ics and psychology at Smith. In exchange. Smith students and
faculty go to colleges in places as diverse as Australia, Russia
and Korea. Having international students at Smith exposes its
See STUDENTS on page 2A
/
Inside
PHOTO/PAUL WILLI8AMS ill
Nikolai Tsatsyne, Fumiko Shimizu, Eugene Zhelobanov, Anastassia Korneeva and Alexei Denisov
(left to right) are spending the semester at Johnson C. Smith University as part of an exchange
program that gives students the opportunity to study and live in foreign countries.
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