About 400 minority contractors and supporters gathered at MOKAN’s 34th Annual Awards Dinner recently at the Hilton St. Louis Airport and listened as a renowned professor and business consultant likened their self-determination and persistence to Humpty Dumpty.
“And all the king’s horsemen and all the king’s men couldn’t put Humpty together again,” recited Benjamin Akande, who is dean of Webster University’s School of Business and Technology. “The key word is again,” Akande said. “He had tried to climb that wall before. We all have our walls to climb. The key is when we fall, do we get up and keep trying, cracks and all?”
In this recession economy, Akande said minority contractors and MOKAN, whose mission is to assist small and minority contractors working in the construction industry, have clearly decided to get up. “I’m convinced that MOKAN will be the benchmark for minority and majority companies to work together,” Akande said. “It will no longer be `us.’ It will be we. The theme of the awards dinner was “Participation Through Partnership.”
Yaphett El-Amin, executive director of MOKAN, said collaboration is the key to the organization’s future. “This event is more about what is possible when people with good will and justice in their hearts work toward a common goal,” El-Amin said. “The struggle for inclusion has not been easy.”
In 1999, MOKAN members organized a protest to highlight the lack of minority contractors on MoDOT projects. The protest attracted more than 1,000 people and shutdown Interstate 70 during rush hour traffic, leading to 125 arrests. El-Amin said the organization’s strategy may change, but its desires are the same. “We will negotiate in the board room. We will network and collaborate,” she said.
Recently, MOKAN leadership decided not to participate in a demonstration that highlighted the current lack of minority participation on MoDOT projects. The demonstration was near the anniversary of the 1999 protest. The African American Business Contractors Association (AABCA) organized the protest. Some have wondered if MOKAN’s decision signaled a division between the two groups. But MOKAN officials said there is no division. Pat Washington, a communications consultant for MOKAN, said El-Amin’s words were not directed toward AABCA, adding that AABCA representatives attended the awards dinner last week. “The environment is ripe for manipulation. Historically, this environment has pitted black advocacy groups against each other,” Washington said. “There is room at the table for everyone.”
El-Amin agreed.
“MOKAN is moving forward in a new direction but with the same mission. We know it won’t be easy,” El-Amin said. “There are rams in the bush who seek to create dissention, whose objective is to pit one group against another. But we can’t be distracted from our goal.”
The recipients of MOKAN’s annual awards are as follows: Lifetime Achievement Award, Attorney Margaret Bush Wilson; Distinguished Public Servant of the Year Award, Becky James-Hatter, Big Brothers Big Sisters of Eastern Missouri.; Public Sector of the Year Award, Dr. Henry Givens, Jr. ,Harris-Stowe State University; General Contractor of the Year Award, Frank H. Haase of R.G. Ross Construction Co.; MBE Contractor of the Year, Marion A. Hayes III, BRK Electrical Contractors, LLC; WBE Contractor of the Year Award, Patricia D. Whitaker, Arcturis.
