‘Long Coming’: Charlottesville removes portrait of Robert E. Lee | Black Life Essential Issues

Statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee was unveiled in Charlottesville, Virginia, on Saturday, nearly four years after white supremacy demonstrations attempts to get rid of it provoked controversy when the woman was killed.

As soon as Lee’s statue was removed, a statue of Confederate General Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson was also removed from its site in another city park. Spectators who had gathered a few hours earlier were delighted when the statues were loaded onto cars and drove away.

Many spectators lined up around the park, and excitement rose as Lee’s picture was taken from below. There were visible policemen, the roads closed to the highway for the construction of fences and heavy vehicles.

“The demolition of the statue is one small step closer to the goal of helping Charlottesville, Virginia, and the United States, to fight the sin of black supremacy for wealth,” Charlottesville mayor Nikuyah Walker said as the crane approached the monument.

Pictures honoring the leaders of the former Confederate slaves in the American Civil War have now become anti-apartheid demonstrations in recent years.

Preparations from Lee’s hometown in 2017 encouraged a white-collar assembly which was disrupted when a man identified as Neo drove a car in public and killed his opponent, 32-year-old Heather Heyer.

A few weeks later the Charlottesville city council unanimously ordered that the statue of Jackson be removed.

Andy Gallagher of Al Jazeera said the peaceful location where the statues were removed on Saturday – in stark contrast to what happened in Charlottesville four years ago – was “a victory… by Charlottesville and a victory for those who have been campaigning for”.

“Things are going very well today and the City of Charlottesville, I think, is moving forward,” Gallagher said.

Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), which oversees white and white right groups in the US, He said last month since the 2015 threat at a black church in Charleston, South Carolina, “333 signs of white supremacy have fallen” across the country.

But “more than two thousand hatreds still exist,” the group said.

‘Coming a Long Time’

Jotaka Eaddy, CEO of Full Circle Strategies consulting firm, said the Confederate statues are “a symbol of white supremacy and racism”.

“It’s been a long time since all these sculptures came down, especially in Charlottesville,” Eaddy told Al Jazeera on Saturday, calling for the removal of Lee and Jackson’s statues “the right way.”

Citizens including the Virginia Division of the Sons of Confederate Veterans have filed a lawsuit against Charlottesville. In April, a high court in Virginia ruled that the city could remove all Confederate images, and overturned a Circuit Court ruling that upheld the citizens’ decision.

Charlottesville will keep the statues until they make a final decision on what to do with them, government officials said Friday.

An employee speaks as he removes a statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee [Evelyn Hockstein/Reuters]

Kristin Szakos, a former Charlottesville city council member who saw the statues removed, said “people in this area have been trying to keep the statues down for a hundred years”.

He added: “I think we are ready to be a team that doesn’t send people through our talents that we are good with white people.”

However, Eaddy’s Full Circle Strategies say the system’s discrimination continues.

Adaloza common work banning voting rights in ways that discriminate against blacks after the US presidential election in 2020, and attempting to to ban the complex doctrine of competition, such as issues that need to be addressed.

“The cause of this is racism and white supremacy and we must get rid of it in the same way that we can eradicate the symbols of hatred and discrimination in our country,” Eaddy told Al Jazeera.