
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, May 25, 1993                   TAG: 9305250143
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: LIBREVILLE, GABON                                LENGTH: Medium

KEEP FOCUS, BLACKS URGED ROOM SHORTAGE CAUSES HARD FEELINGS AT SUMMIT IN

Angry and tearful, the Rev. Jesse Jackson opened a African-American meeting Monday by scolding black Americans for griping about hotel rooms and forgetting their mission: to build a bond with Africans.

Hundreds of Americans who arrived aboard chartered aircraft late Sunday found their rooms already booked, partly because of last-minute decisions of some African delegations to attend.

Scores slept in the lobby of the Inter-Continental Hotel in this West African city on the Atlantic coast. Many complained about transportation problems and the language barrier in the former French colony.

"It's important we have the right spirit for this conference," Jackson said. "The fact a few of us can't get a room with a bed or a cab ride - we're not in New York. . . . We've got to get a hold of that madness right now . . . the stakes are too high, life is too short!"

Many cheered, but a few heckled. "He's got a room," said one woman, and another called out, "Can I stay with you?"

The African-American Summit is billed as a hard-nosed look at ways to increase trade ties and investment in Africa, to improve health care and farming techniques.

More than 1,000 black Americans attended with thousands of Africans, including 20 heads of state.

The summit drew Andrew Young, Coretta Scott King, Louis Farrakhan, former Health and Human Services Secretary Louis Sullivan, actor Denzel Washington, evangelist Robert Schuller, Virginia Gov. Douglas Wilder and U.S. Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich.

Some morning workshops were canceled while organizers found people places to stay. U.S. officials organized meetings between black American and African businessmen.

Conyers, a Democrat from Detroit, chided Africans and Americans about assuming that black people from the wealthy United States had the answers for their brethren in the world's most impoverished continent.

"You think we don't have joblessness, the scourge of unemployment," he said angrily. "We came here not to give you answers but to together solve the problems of black people [everywhere]."

by CNB