Recently, the nation was told Wall Street helped create Jackson’s water crisis. We must remember that Mayor Chokwe Antar Lumumba has publicly thanked Michael Bloomberg and Goldman Sachs, stars of Wall Street, and called them his “partners.” While it is true that we cannot trust the forces of finance (or industrial) capital. Furthermore, we cannot trust Black capitalists who in the name of overcoming disparities and building intergenerational wealth exploit and steal from Jackson either. It is peculiar that economic researchers who wish to defend the Jackson city government haven’t discovered what Mayor Lumumba called himself the “civil conspiracy” in February-March 2020.
Moody’s Credit Rating and Jackson’s Debt Servicing
How has another sector of Wall Street, not the mayor’s friends and partners, given the city a hard time? Partially, as the explanation goes, this is a result that the prominent Moody’s Investor Service, downgraded the Jackson city government’s credit, to a junk status. We are told this decision happened even though Jackson never defaulted on its debt. That this rating caused the Jackson city government an extra $2 to 4 million per year in debt servicing costs. They say this has been a massive road block for the city government taking the lead in fixing the city-owned water and sewage system.
Some believe this underscores how Wall Street keeps city governments from fixing and maintaining public infrastructure. Note the critics who gathered this information did not denounce the capitalist system as a whole. Maybe they believe if the wealthy capitalists treated the aspiring Black capitalist rulers better, disparities would be overcome, and those who exploit labor and maintain property relations could live happily ever after. They already sit down together at the table of brotherhood far more than most realize.
The Victory Lap and the Civil Conspiracy
If this is part of the truth, it is not the whole truth. And if it is rooted in basic facts, these are being marshaled to defend Mayor Lumumba’s city government whose balanced budgets and regular debt payments, actually cover up what the Mayor termed himself “a civil conspiracy.”
In February-March 2020, Mayor Lumumba took a victory lap and had a press conference. He proclaimed he recovered $90 million from the flawed city contract with Siemens, where faulty water meters were installed. In his litigation he also underscored the plunder of Black subcontractors as evasive and unaccountable. But this was not discussed at his press conference or commentary about his successful litigation that was settled.
There is a reason why the mayor doesn’t want the press to ask probing questions about the Siemens settlement. Sometimes, litigation settled out of court without going to trial, obscures transparency to everyday people, who do not often read legal documents in the public domain. What happened to the money accumulated by Black folks in what Lumumba’s litigation called the “civil conspiracy?” It is not my sensationalism, that is what the Black folks who collaborated with Siemens were called by the mayor.
Critiquing Black Capitalism or Letting Negroes Steal from the City
The “radical” mayor seems to be offering his most penetrating critique of Black capitalism — for some reason only in the litigation itself. He has suggested in the past he is not opposed to Black business but this doesn’t mean pillaging and plundering the public interest. Who are the Black capitalists who have exploited Jackson? Why doesn’t he name them at his press conferences as he did in his litigation?
Mayor Lumumba has recovered monies from Siemens, a Germany based multi-national conglomerate, conveniently bringing the matter to a close. Why doesn’t he recover the monies paid to the Black subcontractors where his litigation argued they were false “pass throughs” not genuine Black businesses qualified to do the work under consideration?
Fighting Corruption without Naming the Negroes in Public
Mayor Lumumba, as is his pattern, fights corruption in government without naming the actual people who are corrupt in government. His reflection that before his initiative to sue Siemens he did not fully understand the gravity of the disastrous contract the city signed does not clarify what he learned specifically, and when he learned it.
The fact is the Siemens contract, and the Black subcontractors with whom the city did business, are not names unknown to the city. The contract evaluation and signing in 2012–2013 goes back to Mayor Harvey Johnson. The next two subsequent mayors, Mayor Chokwe Lumumba and Mayor Tony Yarber were on the city council at the time. The elder Lumumba was elected mayor in 2013.
The elder Mayor Lumumba, during his campaign and in his brief administration raised concerns about the ethics of the Siemens contract, but his untimely death undermined his pursuit. The first payments for the contract were already delivered and he was advised that to pull out at that point could lead to the city being sued for breach of contract. But as city council member, the elder Lumumba was also concerned that Black subcontractors must be added to the original deal with Siemens.
Mayor Tony Yarber came under scrutiny through rumor about a federal probe that suggested he may have been central to the framing of the corruption of the Siemens contract. Mayor Chokwe Antar Lumumba came to power following Yarber.
How Come the Black United Front Around Jackson Doesn’t Say These Negroes Names?
When we look closely at the present mayor’s litigation, we see that he sued not just Siemens but its Black subcontractors. Who were they?
If the mayor’s supporters believe they are enemies of the people, as the litigation suggested in tones of “conspiracy,” why don’t the activists for the government in Jackson and around the country shout: “Say their names!”
U.S. Consolidated Inc. (the registered agent being Tom Wallace)
U.S. Consolidated Group LLC (the registered agent is Tommy Wallace)
M.A.C. & Associates (registered agent Marcus L. Wallace)
iVision IT (registered agent James Covington)
Garrett Enterprises (registered agent L. Socrates Garrett)
Mayor Chokwe Antar Lumumba in his litigation holds Siemens liable for hiring sham contractors and middle men where the city asked them, and their local representative Chris McNeil, to hire quality minority owned subcontractors. The argument is they hired “pass throughs.” This suggests these Black capitalists were compradors, or self-aggrandizing partners with white capitalists, who producing nothing, took their share or fees for legitimating the exchange.
Are there legitimate Black capitalists in Lumumba’s worldview? Can Black capital accumulators be liberators? Did the last three African American mayors (two were on the city council at the time) rely solely on Chris McNeil to propose who would be the subcontractors?
The people of Jackson are not “boo boo the fool.”
Oh Where, Oh Where Have the Black Capitalists Who Stole from City Gone?
Lumumba’s litigation suggests the personalities of these contractors, their associates, and whereabouts might be unknown to the general public. They have been public figures in the metro Jackson for years!
Tom Wallace, African American former state representative, was supposed to sell water meters to Siemens for the Jackson project, but the politician’s company bought the meters from another firm and then sold them to Siemens at a higher price, which drove up the city’s expenses.
His son Tommy L. Wallace, another aspiring local politician who wanted to move the city zoo to enhance his own real estate schemes was also part of the scheme. Both Wallaces head a lobbying firm to steer corporations in their relations with government. Was this not a conflict of interest to be a partner in this city contract?
Marcus L. Wallace, African American mayor of Edwards and recent candidate for state transportation administrator, admitted to being involved in more than 100 projects related to the contract, and that he had hired 130 people to work on it.
Marcus L. Wallace’s company was tasked with the installation of new water meters, and water plant and sewer line repairs. He said his company performed about 25 to 30 percent of that work, and contracted out the rest to Hemphill Construction Inc. owned by the Richard Rula family, a white family. Wallace likely has overstated the actual percentage of the work and the quality of his firm’s competency.
Are the Wallaces, who have been doing politics and business in metro Jackson for more than twenty years, hard to find? Are they unknown to the Black political class?
Does Anybody Read the Local Jackson, Mississippi Press? It’s on the Internet Ya’ Know.
According to Mayor Lumumba’s City of Jackson litigation published in the Jackson Free Press/Mississippi Free Press, Siemen’s and the city government paid the Wallaces’ U.S. Consolidated $19.5 million dollars. By itself that is more than the debt-servicing that “critics of Wall Street” discover with the problem with Moodys, not Bloomberg or Goldman Sachs.
One of the problems with fingering Garrett Enterprises Consolidated Inc., who was paid $4.6 million for construction management and quality control services, is that it is owned by L. Socrates Garrett, Jackson’s incoming chairman of the Jackson Chamber of Commerce in 2013. Is not the function of such chambers to cultivate business in the city?
Socrates Garrett was well known to the elder Lumumba in 2013. Garrett already had a dispute in 2008 with the city for mishandling of services for debris removal. Questionable business practices do not put you out of business when you have friends in government.
Both the elder Lumumba and Garrett cut ribbons together at public events. This doesn’t make them the best of friends. However, the elder Lumumba was aware of his business aspirations. That is what Chambers of Commerce are meant to promote; its members aim to accumulate capital. It is unclear what useful services, Garrett actually performed, if any, to benefit the citizens of Jackson, under the Equal Business Opportunity (EBO) plan.
Radicals and Conservatives Cutting Ribbons at Public Events
An EBO plan is an ordinance that seeks government contracts with ethnically and gender diverse competent business owners. The elder Lumumba was lauded as the socialist who was quite friendly to business and who understood the need to rebuild the city’s infrastructure. It is well known that Mayor Yarber and Socrates Garrett are close. Yarber is a political opponent of the Lumumba family.
In another alleged scheme, as documented by Mayor Lumumba’s litigation, James Covington’s iVision IT Consultants LLC, a minority-owned business, received $11 million to implement the new billing system, but another company ended up doing most of the work.
The present Mayor Chokwe Antar Lumumba loves remarking that critics like to weaponize his transparency to score political points. But he took no questions at his press conference and wishes to bring this episode to an end. The public record shows Covington critiquing Mayor Lumumba and making campaign contributions as James Covington/iVision IT Consultants (not to forget the Black owned prison builder M3A.)
Weaponizing Lumumba’s Transparency or Chasing Down the Negro as Capitalist?
Supporters of Mayor Lumumba might say, well, if Covington did commit fraud, the mayor’s willingness to sue Covington, even though Covington gave him campaign money, proves his political independence. Not necessarily.
The mayor has recuperated from Siemens almost $90 million dollars. What has he recuperated from the Wallaces $19.5 million, Mr. Covington’s $11 millions or Garrett’s $4.6 million? The litigation says their failure to provide contracted services undermined the repair of the city water system.
If these are Mayor Lumumba’s own words, as people mobilize today to resist environmental racism and Wall Street, where is the clarification that the mayor is also a friend of Wall Street, and has not gone after the Black capitalists who stole from the city in the name of fixing the water system?
Mayor Chokwe Antar Lumumba’s litigation does a “bait and switch.” It begins by suggesting Chris McNeil, the local representative of Siemens, overstated how the contract would easily pay for itself with subsequent revenues.
If it did not, what does this have to do wwhat does this have to do with the Black subcontractors? Did the inclusion of these Black subcontractors inflate the city’s expenses for the project? How is this the fraud of Siemens when all the subcontractors are known by the Black political class in the city?
Mayor Lumumba speaks of a “civil conspiracy” in his litigation of the Black subcontractors even as he holds Chris McNeil and Siemens also responsible. Multi-national forces are not civil or local conspirators.
If Wallace, Covington, and Garrett Need Not Return the Money Then…
If there will be no consequences for the Wallaces, Covingtons, and Garretts, if they need not return their money for their civil conspiracy, then others may be part of this conspiracy.
Mayor Lumumba’s claim to fight corruption and to separate out legitimate Black business aspirations from fraud may be more than false. It may be self-interested.
In February 2020, the City Council’s critique of the mayor for the overpaying of Akil Bakari and Expert Solutions LLC could be a sign that Mayor Lumumba has rattled the cages of the Black political class in Jackson so badly that they all hold him in contempt for he has routed the sleazy.
Yet if the Wallaces, Covingtons, and Garretts and the like can informally transfer money to Mayor Lumumba or his associates after the Siemens scandal blows over, black unity above society can be sustained. We may be witnessing a campaign of disinformation and misdirection.
The only way to assure the public interest is really defended is to pursue civil and criminal penalties against the “Black subcontractors” that in Lumumba’s public press conferences he consistently prefers to be nameless.
Say The Name of the Black Capitalists Who Undermined Jackson’s Water System
It doesn’t matter whether Siemens, a multi-national conglomerate, settled the dispute (and they still are quarreling about the terms). Unless we are saying that Black self-determination is preserved when multi-nationals pay reparations but the exploiters in the Black political class do not have to pay. Lumumba sued them — but they don’t have to pay. There was no settlement with the Black capitalists. The members of the Black political class who stole from the public budget did not return the monies from their conspiracy.
If and when Siemens settles the entire financial contract to Mayor Lumumba’s satisfaction, and if the local Black capitalists are or have been permitted to keep their money from the exchange, then somehow while the water system was not fixed, contributions to “intergenerational wealth” for Black elites was facilitated anyway.
Kali Akuno’s Cooperation Jackson, who has made demands on hierarchical government, to do business with minority capitalists in the future to facilitate the building of intergenerational wealth, has made no statement about the Black capitalists who robbed the city in the name of fixing the water system in recent times.
If Moody’s decision on Jackson’s city government credit rating cost the city $2 to 4 million extra since 2018 (four years ago), and if we round up and say that is in total an extra $16 million a year that could have been spent on the city’s water and sewage system, Lumumba could have recouped more than this amount by asking the Black capitalists associated with the Sieman’s contract to pay back the monies they secured from the city that adds up to oh, how about, $35 million dollars? And if they do not return this money to Jackson, what are the judicial consequences for these “Negroes,” proper outdated names for degenerate people?
There’s nothing like an anti-corruption crusade against the exploitive Black political class where their names are forgotten by the authorities (and the activists) who in Jackson, MS very often are the same people.
This post was reposted from Stories by Adofo Minka on Medium
