Atlanta ( CNN ) -- The board of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference is meeting to discuss whether to keep its current president . `` There has been speculation '' that President Isaac Newton Farris Jr. will be dismissed , `` but that has not been decided , '' Maynard Eaton , the SCLC 's communications director , said Tuesday night . `` His status is uncertain , '' Eaton said . Eaton said the deliberations regarding Farris were `` not about character but about the direction the organization is going to go in the future . '' Farris was elected president after the death of his predecessor , the Rev . Howard W. Creecy Jr. , in July 2011 . The Atlanta-based civil rights group is closely linked to the Rev . Martin Luther King , Jr. , who co-founded the organization along with Ralph David Abernathy and served as its first president . Farris is King 's nephew . The SCLC has suffered through internal struggles in recent years as two competing factions claimed to run the organization . In 2010 , a Fulton County court ruled in favor of the national board . Creecy became president in January 2011 after King 's daughter Bernice King turned down the position , saying she was `` not interested in merely being a figurehead '' and criticizing the `` turmoil , chaos and confusion '' that had surrounded the SCLC for more than a year . After becoming SCLC president , Creecy selected Farris , 50 , as his vice president , Eaton said .
`` His status is uncertain , '' spokesman says of Farris has been SCLC president since the death of his predecessor recent years . The Rev . Farris was Martin Luther King Jr. ' uncle . The organization has gone though internal strife in last year .