African Activist Archive

Letter to Bishop Desmond Tutu from Patrick Hagopian, a Steering Committee member of the Martin Luther King Anti-Apartheid Coalition and member of the University of Pennsylvania Anti-Apartheid Coalition, about your forthcoming visit to Philadelphia, especially your visit to the University of Pennsylvania. I understand that Joe Miller has informed you that in addition to the lecture in Irvine Auditorium on the evening of January 15, there will be an anti-apartheid demonstration on campus that afternoon. Hagopian reiterates the invitation extended to you, and to thank you for your preliminary agreement to participate in the demonstration. The Martin Luther King Anti-Apartheid Coalition formed a year ago to commemorate Martin Luther King's birthday by holding an anti-apartheid rally and vigil. The coalition was endorsed by dozens of religious, community, student and labor groups, and the rally brought together people from all over Philadelphia. The trustees of the university will meet on January 16-17 and will deciding whether or not to divest their $92 million in holdings in U.S. companies doing business in South Africa. The multi-year campaign for divestment at the university has included four rallies, two vigils, and a number of other campus events in the last year alone. The University Council, representing faculty, administrators, and students, and the student assemblies have endorsed complete divestment. Nevertheless, the trustees have stuck to supporting the Sullivan Principles, and have actually expanded investments in corporations that subscribe to the principles. The letter summarizes Tutu's likely schedule in Philadelphia, according to Jacqueline Wade of the Afro-American Studies Department and of the committee organizing the Martin Luther King Commemoration at the university.

African Activist Archive

[Dear Bishop Tutu]

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