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London Mayor Sadiq Khan Sets Up A 15-Member 'Diversity Commission' To Review City's Statues, Street Names,Building Names,Memorials
Swarajya Staff
Feb 11, 2021, 06:56 PM | Updated 06:56 PM IST
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London mayor Sadiq Khan has announced the names of the 15 panellists who will be members of the new Landmark Commission set up to improve diversity in the capital’s public spaces, The Guardian reported.
The members of new landmark Commission have been tasked with ensuring London’s historic achievements are properly reflected across the capital.
The Commission has been also be asked to explore better ways to raise public understanding behind existing statues, street names, building names and memorials.
The Mayor stressed that the purpose of the Commission was not to remove statues.
The 15-member panel will include actor Riz Ahmed, social rights activist Toyin Agbetu and art historian Aindrea Emelife.
Sadiq Khan is of the view that majority of London’s statues, street names and memorials largely reflect Victorian Britain and wants to tell the "full story of the capital and to commemorate those from every community who have made London what it is."
Khan had announced the setting up of the commission days after a statue of Edward Colston, a 17th-century slave trader and and philantropist, was pulled down in Bristol by Black Lives Matter protesters last summer and thrown in the water.
Colston, widely credited with playing an instrumental role in developing Bristol in the 17th century, was also a prominent slave trader who made enormous fortune out of it . Historians say he shipped 84,000 Africans to the Americas.
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