 'The strength, the courage': Oprah Winfrey and Disney chief Bob Iger lead the tributes to Chadwick Boseman - while Marvel co-stars and Denzel Washington express their shock at his death from cancer aged 43
Chadwick Boseman died at the age of 43 after enduring a four-year battle with colon cancer. Oprah Winfrey took to Twitter shortly after news broke to post a heartfelt tribute to the Black Panther star. 'What a gentle gifted SOUL. Showing us all that Greatness in between surgeries and chemo. The courage, the strength, the Power it takes to do that. This is what Dignity looks like,' wrote the 66-year-old media mogul. Meanwhile Bob Iger, the Executive Chairman of The Walt Disney Company, which produces the Marvel films that made Boseman a superstar, also paid tribute. The mogul described Chadwick as 'an extraordinary talent, and one of the most gentle and giving souls I have ever met,' in his Twitter thread. He continued: 'Becoming a long-awaited hero to millions around the world, and inspiring us all to dream bigger and demand more than the status quo. We mourn all that he was, as well as everything he was destined to become.' Iger went on to address Boseman's grieving relatives and fans: 'His absence from the screen is only eclipsed by his absence from our lives. All of us at Disney send our prayers and heartfelt condolences to his family.' Boseman, who was diagnosed with stage three colon cancer in 2016, never spoke publicly about his diagnosis. It, eventually, progressed to stage four. 'A true fighter, Chadwick persevered through it all, and brought you many of the films you have come to love so much,' wrote Chadwick's grieving family in a statement. 'From Marshall to Da 5 Bloods, August Wilson's Ma Rainey's Black Bottom and several more- all were filmed during and between countless surgeries and chemotherapy. It was the honor of his career to bring King T'Challa to life in Black Panther,' the statement concluded. Boseman became a household name in 2018 with his role as young king T'Challa in Marvel's blockbuster superhero film Black Panther. Source : DailyMail.co.uk, 29 August 2020  Paulette Wilson, a prominent Windrush campaigner who was wrongly detained and threatened with deportation by the Home Office, has died unexpectedly at the age of 64, a month after delivering a petition to Downing Street calling on the government to deliver justice to those affected by the scandal. Wilson’s daughter, Natalie Barnes, said she had found her mother on Thursday morning; she appeared to have died in her sleep. “My mum was a fighter and she was ready to fight for anyone. She was an inspiration to many people. She was my heart and my soul and I loved her to pieces,” Barnes said. Wilson moved to Britain from Jamaica aged about 10 in 1968, to join her grandparents. She went to primary and secondary school in Britain, and worked as a chef for most of her life, for a while in the House of Commons restaurant. She had travelled to the UK legally but in 2016 she received a letter informing her that she was an immigration offender, and needed to take immediate steps to return to Jamaica, a country she had not visited in half a century. She was arrested twice, and spent time in Yarl’s Wood immigration removal centre, before being transferred to another centre in Heathrow in 2017, ahead of a flight to Kingston. It was only a last-minute intervention by her MP, Emma Reynolds, and the Refugee and Migrant Centre in Wolverhampton, that prevented her deportation. Wilson’s decision to speak to the Guardian in 2017 about her wrongful arrest and detention encouraged dozens of other people to come forward and describe how they also had found themselves wrongly classified as immigration offenders. About 164 were mistakenly detained or removed from the UK. When the scandal broke in April 2018 it provoked the resignation of the then home secretary, Amber Rudd, and the government was forced to apologise. Wilson later said she had been put through “the worst heartache anyone could go through”. She and her daughter dedicated much of the past two-and-a-half years to raising awareness of the difficulties experienced by thousands of people who had arrived in the UK legally in the 50s and 60s, before wrongly being categorised as immigration offenders. When she visited Downing Street last month to deliver a petition calling for compensation to be speeded up, she said she was disappointed that she was still having to campaign for justice. She had hoped two years ago that there would be a swifter resolution of everyone’s difficulties and faster payment of compensation to all victims. “The word ‘sorry’ can roll off anyone’s tongue easily, but we don’t want more apologies,” she said. Paulette is survived by her daughter and her granddaughter. “She was widely loved and respected; her laugh was infectious and she loved to see people smile; she will be missed by us all,” Barnes said. The Windrush campaigner Patrick Vernon said he was in “deep shock”. “She was campaigner like many others fighting for justice. There is growing evidence that the impact of the Windrush scandal and hostile environment is having a major impact on mental health and well-being of the survivors. We now need to campaign to end the hostile environment and for the compensation to managed independently from the Home Office,” he said. Source : The Guardian, 23 July 2020  Today’s Google Doodle is dedicated to activist Olive Morris on what would have been her 68th birthday. The Doodle of Olive is by Google Doodler and Londoner Matthew Cruickshank. It shows a mural of her in the street where she used to live – Railton Road, in Brixton. If you don’t yet know what Olive Morris achieved in her life, which was cut sadly short in 1979, then read on, because we’ve got a brief history lesson about this oft-forgotten activist right here… Olive Morris was an activist who campaigned for racial, gender and social equality. Born in Jamaica on 26 June 1952, she moved to London with her family when she was nine. Olive died at just 27 of Non-Hodgkin lymphoma but managed to do so much with the short time she was given.  he helped found the Brixton Black Women’s Group – one of the nation’s very first networks for Black women – and she to co-founded the Organisation of Women of Asian and African Descent.
She was also a member of the British Youth Black Panther Movement, and campaigned for squatter’s rights. A Google representative said: ‘There has never been a more timely moment to commemorate the birthday of Olive Morris, whose fight for equality, left an extraordinary legacy of local activism in Brixton and beyond. ‘We hope that by recognising and celebrating Olive Morris with a Google Doodle, we can inspire others to keep pushing forward for change.’ Source : Metro, 26 June 2020  In response to the ongoing COVID-19 situation, London’s first ever Rum Distillery, Taxi Spirit Co. has launched a new line of Hand Sanitiser using the approved W.H.O version formula 1, in an effort to aid public demand and protection against the highly contagious virus.
Cabby’s Hand Rub can now be purchased from the Taxi Spirit Co.’s dedicated online shop. The company has also committed a percentage from the sales of the sanitiser to a number of NHS charities, and will be donating free batches to local hospitals, charities, businesses and other key workers in need of urgent supplies. Moses Odong, Founder and Director of Taxi Spirit Co. enthused: “We’re seeing that in the wake of the Covid-19 crisis, it is having far-reaching consequences beyond just the spread of the disease and the efforts to quarantine it. “As the pandemic has continued to spread around the country and worldwide, concerns have shifted, and businesses are adapting in an effort to fight this. “Given the nature of our business, we’re in a position to help the public and healthcare service as there is a shortage of sufficient PPE including Hand Sanitisation.” Launched in 2018 by Odong, Taxi Spirit Co. is known for producing its signature, award-winning and currently London’s only premium white rum, CABBY’S RUM. But now, in part due to the UK’s relaxation on the restrictions of the production of sanitiser, the company located in capital’s Mile End, has seen its small batch distillery down tools on its usual production of rum and gin, to repurpose its warehouse and diversify its business offering during this challenging period of the pandemic. Since being established the company has been awarded Outstanding Gold and Silver and Bronze awards at the Oscars of spirit industry – International Wine and Spirits Competition, San Francisco World Spirits Competition, The Spirit Business and The Great Taste Award for their popular range of Rum and Gin. Source : Voice Newspaper 22/5/2020 |
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