From our Arthur Ashe commemorative issue: These Richmonders share Ashe's commitment to strengthen the African-American community.
Omari Kadaffi (Photo by Ash Daniel)
The East Coast earthquake of 2011 marked a turning point for local activist Omari Kadaffi. Sitting in an office in Washington, D.C., the then software engineer quickly realized two things. One was that office cubicles offer little protection in case of earthquakes and, second, that he was too far away from his children in Richmond in an emergency. He instantly made the decision to return to his family and community.
“I was supporting my children, but I wasn’t raising them,” he says.
After his life-changing epiphany, Kadaffi downsized from a lucrative corporate lifestyle to a more modest community orientation. While living in a low-income apartment, he noticed that some of his neighbors had problems with the landlord, so he read up on tenant rights and helped his neighbors negotiate landlord interactions and counter illegal charges. He developed an understanding of oppression through the legal application of practices and policies.
“To some, diversity and inclusion means allowing the black person in the room,” he says. “I’m gonna bring all of me to the table.”
Born Omari Al-Qadaffi, aka Omari Kadaffi Guevara, he grew up in Church Hill before the roundabouts and gentrification. Kadaffi was raised as a member of the Nation of Islam, and his family was among the first in his community to celebrate the African-American cultural holiday of Kwanzaa.
“They were conscious before people were conscious,” he says.
Kadaffi is now at the forefront of a new wave of social activists and community organizers. He is active with the Richmond Food Justice Alliance and the Leaders of the New South – Community Council for Housing (whose logo is a red, black and green Confederate flag superimposed over a public housing unit). As an activist, Kadaffi knocked on doors asking people if they were aware of changes to bus routes that could adversely affect people in lower-income communities. He brought his own surveys and gathered data, and he believes his work helped influence GRTC policies as the transit system serves the neighborhoods of Mosby Court and Oakwood.
“I wanted to help the world,” he says. “I believe in learning something from every person that I meet.”
His multipronged focus includes nutrition, academics, youth violence prevention and housing. Through Community Unity in Action, Kadaffi works with the juvenile justice system, public housing and the health department. At age 37, he represents a model of the “new South”: educated, intelligent, articulate, urban. But he also acknowledges the help and assistance he has received from veteran community organizers such as Lynetta Thompson, Arthur Burton and Lillie A. Estes.
“I walk with the elders,” he says.
When it was time to portray a hero at St. Patrick Catholic School in Church Hill, where black history lessons were taught daily, he says, a young Omari picked Arthur Ashe — while his crush played the role of Althea Gibson, resulting in a rather heated debate over who was the first to win at Wimbledon. (Gibson won in 1957.)
“Arthur Ashe showed black Richmonders that we were worthy of participating in arenas that are typically held and seen as exclusive to whites,” Kadaffi says. “I have a saying that I frequently pass on to disenfranchised members of the Richmond community: ‘What one man can do, another man can do.’ ”
