The son of legendary civil rights campaigner Martin Luther King Jr. will speak at the Bermuda Industrial Union's 25th annual Labour Day banquet on September 1.

Martin Luther King III will join another American civil rights activist, the Rev. Al Sharpton, on the bill for the event at the Fairmont Southampton Resort.

Dr. King was born in 1957 in Montgomery, Alabama, and is the son of Martin Luther King Jr. and Coretta Scott King. He attended Morehouse College, the same college his father attended, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science.

He served as elected commissioner of Fulton County, Georgia, from 1987 to 1993. In 1997, he was elected to head the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, a civil rights organisation founded by his father. He left in January 2004 to take over the King Center for Nonviolent Social change from his brother, Dexter Scott King. This is believed to be his first visit to Bermuda.

This year's banquet will be the second for Rev. Sharpton. The Pentecostal Minister and former presidential candidate previously addressed the Labour Day event in 2004, when he exhorted Bermudians to seize the moment and take responsibility for their own destiny.

Announcing the speakers yesterday, BIU President Chris Furbert said: "We are celebrating the 25th annual Labour Day with a bang. We are very excited to have the likes of these two gentlemen come down and be with us on Labour Day weekend."

Tickets, priced at $80, are available from Mr. Furbert or from LaVerne Furbert at the BIU on 292-0044.