(Image source from: Houston Chronicle)

Scores of friends and supporters gathered at Houston cultural center on Friday for a barbeque fundraiser to aid veteran civil rights activist Johhny Mata, who was diagnosed with cancer earlier this month.

The lunchtime fundraiser took place at the eastside's Talento Bilingue de Houston which was organized by The Greater Houston Coalition for Justice. The group was founded by Mata, who became widely known as an activist while helping organize primal protests following the killing of Joe Campos Torres by a group of Houston police officers in 1977.

Mata has been diagnosed with an uncommon form of cancer that is possibly curable, he said through the telephonic conversation. Mata is not hospitalized but is receiving chemotherapy while beside battling pneumonia.

Mata, 81, is a United States Army veteran who retired after three decades as a staff member of the federally-funded Gulf Coast Community Services Association.

He is widely known as a leader and community activist for over 40 years with the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), one of the largest Hispanic civil rights organizations in America that were established in 1929 to combat virulent racism against Mexican-Americans. Mata served two terms as Texas state director for LULAC, along with other leadership positions within the organization.

Isidro Garza, a state LULAC official, said that one of the most significant achievements by Mata was the creation of the Latino Learning Center, Inc., a nonprofit he co-founded in 1979 that provides vocational training and other services to low-income communities in Houston.

"Mata is that kind of people that help everybody but never thinks of himself; that’s why we are doing this fundraiser, to honor and help him not that he needs us much," Garza said.

Garza was "the cook in chief" of the fund-raising event, "but many people have help to put this together."

The donated amount by others was 1,000 pounds of brisket for the fundraiser while workers at Harvest Market in The Woodlands helped to slice the meat. Many of the barbeque bales were in the form of large bulk orders from the owners and managers of Houston businesses who know Mata.

By Sowmya Sangam