A demonstration by thousands of African American youths is set to take place next week in Harlem, after its organisers defeated an attempt by city officials here to redirect it to more remote park venues outside central New York.

The organisers of the planned Million Youth March – scheduled to take place all day on Sep. 5 – won a key victory against Mayor Rudolph Giuliani this week, after a Federal District Court judge ruled Wednesday that holding the march outside Harlem would hinder the marchers’ efforts “to get their message out”.

Judge Lewis Kaplan ruled that New York City officials had not demonstrated that the march would pose a “significant threat” if it were not redirected. He said the rules behind an initial denial of the marchers’ permit were “breathtaking in their lack of standards”.

“The march is on,” exulted march organiser Malik Shabazz. “We have changed the laws in this circuit … We have defeated Giuliani.”

The organisers had accused the city of refusing to grant them a permit to march along Malcolm X Boulevard in Harlem because of what they said was Giuliani’s “dislike for one of the conveners of the rally”, former Nation of Islam Minister Khalid Abdul Muhammad.

Muhammad has referred to Jews as “blood-suckers”, and has repeatedly made anti-Semitic and anti-white statements. That led to his ouster in 1993 from the black nationalist Nation of Islam group led by Louis Farrakhan.

Giuliani, who has called the Sep. 5 event a “hate march” organised by a racist, had claimed nevertheless that the denial of the permit to march in Harlem had been based on security considerations. The city had told Kaplan that Malcolm X Boulevard could not accommodate a march intended for a million youths – whereas the outlying Randall Island and Van Cortlandt Parks, suggested as alternative venues, could do so.

Organisers countered that the actual numbers would be closer to 170,000 than one million, but the city argued that even this would be too much for the area to handle. For marchers, however, Harlem was essential as the venue because of its historic role as a “Mecca of black life”, according to one of the organisers’ attorneys, Roger Wareham.

Wareham, along with other attorneys, argued before Judge Kaplan that the city regularly grants permits for even larger events. “The city’s policy is totally arbitrary about to whom they grant permits and when,” said Wareham.

Giuliani, however, is adamant that the logistics for providing security remain difficult, and challenged Judge Kaplan’s determination that the police could handle it. “The police commissioner isn’t sure, and he knows a little more about the Police Department than the judge does,” the combative mayor said at a Wednesday press conference.

Police Commissioner Howard Safir said that police had been planning security options in the event of a Harlem march, and that such efforts would continue.

The march, defined broadly as a show of unity among young black people, along the lines of the 1995 Million Man March organised by Farrakhan in Washington, has been controversial even among African American leaders. Lacking a specific agenda, it has been depicted by some leaders as an extension of Muhammad’s ideology, because he has been its most visible spokesperson.

Muhammad’s rhetoric and the standoff with the city have sparked concerns that there might be a violent confrontation between young marchers and police on Sep. 5. This worry has made it difficult for some black leaders to come out in support of the march.

In recent days, however, support for the march has been growing, in part because of Giuliani’s perceived hostility towards it. The Rev. Al Sharpton, a local black leader, conceded recently, “It’s partly because of Rudolph Giuliani that I take this position (of backing the march).”

The Rev. Calvin Butts, pastor of Harlem’s prominent Abyssinian Baptist Church, also threw his weight behind the march recently, saying that he was standing behind the young people helping with the march – not Minister Muhammad. “Nothing these young people are talking about includes violence or hatred towards any people,” said Butts, who has challenged Giuliani’s policies as racist in recent months.

Nevertheless, even march supporters and Judge Kaplan are under no illusion about Muhammad’s credentials, following his controversial tenure at the Nation of Islam where he was perceived as too racist and anti-Semitic even by Farrakhan, the group’s equally controversial leader.

In his Wednesday ruling, Kaplan noted that Muhammad has made “outrageous, inflammatory and prejudiced” remarks against Jews, including a speech last year in which he criticised “hook-nosed, bagel-eating, lox-eating” Jews.

“There is no question that Khalid Abdul Muhammad has made outrageous anti-Semitic statements, but the first amendment (of the U.S. Constitution) says that even a bigot has a right to protest,” argued Norman Siegel, the executive director of the New York Civil Liberties Union (NYCLU).

The NYCLU supported the march organisers’ federal case.