BOLTON'S first black mayor has been recognised for his services to the community in the New Years Honours List with an OBE.

Cllr Campbell Benjamin told the Evening News he was delighted to receive the award and said it would prove to be a major boost to ethnic minorities in the town.

The veteran West Indian Labour councillor who has represented Breightmet for 15 years and given decades of unstinting service to the town working for what later became Bolton Racial Equality Council after the war.

Born in the sun-soaked island of of Antigua, he volunteered to join in the war effort and worked in a munitions factory in Liverpool in 1942.

In 1945 he came to Bolton to work on aircraft at the former Dobson and Barlow factory and found the people there "warm and homely".

On Bolton Council he became chairman of the Equal Opportunities Committee and represented Bolton on the Police Authority for many years as chairman of the Community Relations Committee. He also helped to develop the network of lay visitors to police stations and on the national scene attended major conferences of the National Association of Lay Visitors.

He has also been involved with the local United Nations Association and has attended international conferences in Paris discussing issues relating to crime and drugs.

But the crowning of his political career came in 1993 when he became mayor, an honour many thought was long overdue. Both he and his wife Brenda, who was his mayoress received many tributes when he completed his year of office.

In his maiden speech as the town's first citizen he made a plea for racial harmony saying the appointment was a recognition by Bolton Council that it was serving a multi-racial community.

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