At 15 years old, Orlanzo George Cole left Moat Boys Secondary School in Leicester with little to show in terms of promise. One of his teachers told him he “would never pass an exam in 100 years”.

Cole, a Jamaican, proved the naysayers wrong. On May 19 he was sworn in as Lord Mayor of that British city; the first black person to hold the office.

He had served more than one term as city councillor which made him eligible for the position of Lord Mayor. With COVID-19 still a threat, keeping a grip on the pandemic is one of his priorities.

“Leicester’s main challenges at the moment are COVID-19, austerity and the cost of living crisis. All of these present immense challenges to local and national governments,” Cole told the Jamaica Observer.

Figures from statista.com show that as of May 5, the East Midlands area, where Leicester is located, had close to 1.6 million COVID-19 cases.

Another area in which Cole aims to make improvements is the number of minorities in administrative roles throughout Leicester, which has a population of just over 350,000.

“My aim to promote racial equality will be centred on encouraging the African heritage community to be more proactive in mainstream activities within the city, be that politics, business, education, etc, and to be more in control of our destiny,” he said.

Like most major British cities, Leicester has been a melting pot since the 1960s when Cole emigrated to the United Kingdom to join his parents. According to statistics he provided, blacks comprise 10 per cent of the city’s populace with Antiguans accounting for most of the West Indians there.

Born in Kingston, Cole was 11 years old at the time he arrived in the UK. One of six children, his father was from Manchester and his mother from Clarendon.

Getting accustomed to the chilly weather was one of the challenges he faced in his new home. Discrimination was another.

“Like most cities in the UK at the time, racism was a daily battle. In school, shops, clubs, buses, college; name it and racism was there,” he said.

Mass immigration, however, has changed attitudes for the better.

“The cultural diversity of Leicester is definitely one of its strengths. The racial harmony serves as an example to many towns and cities nationally and internationally,” Cole noted.

After an unceremonious departure from secondary school, his life turned around. He worked as an apprentice wireman in a factory, then as a radio and television repair engineer, computer design engineer, systems design engineer, university lecturer, radio broadcaster and producer.

Cole credits overcoming the UK’s social obstacles and becoming a success to his upbringing.

“The great thing about my parents was that they never left Jamaica in their heads. It was there in everything they did. The way they spoke, the food we ate, the music we listened to, the friends we kept; the list went on,” he said.