NAACP Unit Faces Strife in Wake of Resignation : Civil rights: Critics of official are glad he has left his post. It’s called a time for mending fences.

Critics of controversial NAACP official Willis Edwards said Sunday they were pleased he had resigned, but his supporters praised him for generating national interest in the organization’s Image Awards honoring blacks in the entertainment industry.

Edwards will be succeeded as president of the Beverly Hills-Hollywood chapter of the NAACP by Sandra Evers-Manly, who will remain at her post until elections are held next year.

“There has been lots of turmoil,” Evers-Manly said. “We’ve got some bridges to mend.”

Edwards resigned a few days ahead of a scheduled national inquiry by the National Assn. for the Advancement of Colored People into allegations of his mismanagement of the branch’s affairs.

“We’re glad he resigned,” Connie Watson, a leader of the chapter’s dissidents, said Sunday.

She was among a group protesting outside the Wiltern Theatre on Saturday night during the Image Awards show. Carrying signs such as “What Have You Done For Civil Rights Lately?” the pickets did not know that Edwards had already announced his resignation in a written statement in the Image Awards program.

Edwards “owes it to us to tell the membership of his decision,” she said.

Also disturbing, said Brandy Burton, the branch’s former secretary, was that Edwards’ message was on a page titled “President Emeritus.” She said the branch “has never had a president emeritus, and it’s not clear what powers that leaves him.”

Edwards on Sunday assailed Watson’s comments, saying that she is “not even a member of the branch, and hasn’t been since August. So she has no say so in the organization.”

He would not comment further on his resignation.

At the Wiltern on Saturday, Edwards would say only that “I resigned because I wanted to resign.”

In his written statement, he said:

“Two years ago I vowed that if the Image Awards would successfully be on television for four years and if the Beverly Hills-Hollywood NAACP developed a strong bond with the industry, my job was done.”

Edwards’ supporters said that among his greatest contributions was getting broad exposure for the Image Awards show--nationally televised for the first time in 1986--and pushing for black talent to play major roles in its production.

Television executive Roland McFarland, chairman of the Image Awards show, had high praise for Edwards for generating national interest and funding for the event.

“Willis has a definite style,” McFarland said Sunday. “He’s a risk-taker and he makes the hard decisions. No one in this nation is recognized by the NAACP membership more for his accomplishments at a national level.”

Some chapter members, however, had become increasingly critical of Edwards for not aggressively fighting for civil rights, not keeping a tight rein on finances and, recently, for accepting $25,000 for helping produce last year’s nationally televised Image Awards show.

Saturday’s show was managed by the NAACP’s national staff for only the second time in its 22-year history.

The NAACP’s executive director, Benjamin L. Hooks, told reporters Saturday night that the chapter’s management was taken over in October by the national organization because “we felt there were problems that had exceeded the capacity for the branch to solve.”

Hooks called the move a “temporary solution . . . it does not prejudge” the matter. An NAACP national panel has scheduled a Dec. 19 hearing in Hollywood on the mismanagement allegations.

Edwards’ supporters point to his fight to get more blacks in decision-making jobs in the industry, including major film studios and television news shows, and his success in gaining national exposure for the Image Awards.

But problems continued to plague Edwards. Allegations of financial mismanagement surfaced and some said he ran local meetings with an autocratic hand.

And last September, Beverly Hills-Hollywood NAACP members voted to demand Edwards’ resignation for accepting $25,000 from a network for helping produce the 1988 Image Awards show. Edwards denied any wrongdoing.

Times staff writer Edward J. Boyer contributed to this story

* STORY ON IMAGE AWARDS: F3