Elombe Brath

Cecil Elombe Brath (September 30, 1936 – May 19, 2014) was a Pan-African activist, born in New York City of Barbadian heritage, who is best known for founding the Patrice Lumumba Coalition. He was an influential activist, recognized by Stokely Carmichael as the "Dean of Harlem Nationalists" and by Dudley Thompson, an "Icon of the Pan-African Movement".

Biography He was born in Brooklyn, New York, where his father had migrated from Barbados in the 1920s. and sported large afros.

In 1975 Brath founded, with Irving Davis, the Patrice Lumumba Coalition, They garnered attention for a 1977 boycott of Ipi Tombi, a Broadway musical that purportedly misrepresented life under apartheid.

Brath was the host of the New York City radio show Afrikaleidoscope on WBAI, and often organized events and panels in the city to bring attention to African politics and current events.

In 2003, Brath cofounded the World African Diaspora Union (WADU) to advocate for the unification of the African Diaspora politically, culturally, and economically with Africa. WADU was officially launched in 2004.

The great thinkers whom Brath counted as influences — Marcus Garvey, Malcolm X, Carlos A. Cooks, and his cousin Clennell Wickham — waged a political battle on behalf of working-class blacks in colonial Barbados.

Brath died in Harlem at the age of 77.

Legacy In 2017, Elombe Brath Way was named in his honor.