September 11-17, 2003

city beat

Mega: Green Party Racist

MEGA GRIPES: Will Mega claims a lily-white Green Party snubbed him.

An at-large Council candidate says bias led to endorsement snub.

by Daryl Gale

While last weekís campaign news was dominated by unlit Molotov cocktails, blessed relief from skyrocketing auto insurance rates and the various other sundry byproducts of mayoral politics, at-large City Council candidate Will Mega was making noise about an endorsement he didnít receive.

In an e-mail addressed to the Green Party and sent to local media outlets, Mega claimed the party turned him down because of racism. For proof, the Education Party candidate cited statistics from the City Commissioner's Office that lists African-American membership in the Green Party at less than 1 percent.

"You have no people of color on your City Committee and I believe this is at least the third group of City Committee members to hold office in Philadelphia, where 50 percent of the city's population is black, yet you still do not have any black people in positions of power," Mega wrote on Aug. 23 to Green Party of Philadelphia (GPOP) City Committee Chairperson Mike Rosenberg.

In a Friday phone conversation with City Paper, Mega not only refused to take back his words. He added several more.

"Ask them [Green Party officials] to invite you to a meeting," quipped Mega, a former member of the New Black Panther Party best known for his stint on the CBS reality show Big Brother. "The only thing black in that room are the pens. If they could get away with it, I believe the Green Party would amend its bylaws to prevent blacks from attaining any degree of leadership. Blacks would have to form their own wing: the Collard Green Party."

Mega said he was questioned rather condescendingly about his Black Panther past when he made his endorsement pitch at GPOP's City Committee meeting in July.

"One of them, I don't remember which one, mentioned that even [Black Panther Party co-founder] Bobby Seale is opposed to the New Black Panther Party, as though Bobby is the end-all and be-all of black revolutionary thought," Mega groused. "I told them that I know and respect Bobby, but I see Bobby eating breakfast in a Korean-owned restaurant all the time, so how revolutionary a pro-black radical can he really be nowadays? It was clear they didn't like that remark, but I think they were just looking for a reason to reject me."

Not so, says GPOP City Committee Chair Rosenberg.

"The main reason we turned Will down is because he had already filed with the Education Party," Rosenberg explains. "Yes, some members of the committee did ask about his association with the Black Panthers, but any questions or conclusions the committee had were secondary to the fact ä that he had signed with the Education Party. We could hardly be expected to endorse him as a candidate. It wasn't an inquisition."

And what of Mega's charge that the Philly Greens are lily-white? Rosenberg concedes that's the case but expresses a degree of regret.

"Right now, there are no minorities on the board or on the committee," he says. "But we're trying to change that."

When asked whether there ever were any, Rosenberg hesitates for a long moment before answering quietly.

"Since I've been involved, that was in 2001, there haven't been any and as far as I know, there never have been," Rosenberg says. "The level of minority participation in Philly's Green Party is lagging far behind even the rest of the state. Statewide, the Greens are well represented by minorities of many ethnicities and nationalities, but not in Philly. It's not something we're proud of, but we are keenly aware of the situation, and are taking steps to improve it."

Rosenberg says that because the Green Party is essentially still a small, all-volunteer group, dedicated outreach is the only way to make inroads in minority neighborhoods. Passing out fliers at bus stops and community meetings, as well as establishing relationships with minority groups with progressive politics, says Rosenberg, is how the Greens are trying to make their meetings better reflect Philadelphia.

"We do need to increase our minority participation, no doubt about it," he says. "About that, Will Mega is absolutely correct. But that didn't factor into our decision not to endorse him."