The following events occurred in May 1979:
May 1, 1979 (Tuesday) The Republic of the Marshall Islands was granted self-government within the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands administered by the U.S., with a transition to full independence by 1986. Greenland (Kalaallit Nunaat) was granted limited autonomy from Denmark, with its own Parliament and the capital, Godthåb being renamed Nuuk. Jonathan Motzfeldt was inaugurated as the first Prime Minister of Greenland and served for almost 12 years. The 31-member Inatsisartut was sworn in as the first Greenlandic parliament. Malacañang Palace, the presidential residence of the Philippines in Manila, was reopened after two years of remodeling and rebuilding. American Communist Angela Davis was awarded the Lenin Peace Prize by the Soviet Union. Born: Mauro Bergamasco, Italian rugby union flanker with 106 appearances for the Italian national team; in Padova Died: Ayatollah Morteza Motahhari, Iranian Shia Muslim theologian, Chairman of the Council of the Islamic Revolution and a close associate of the Ayatollah Khomeini, was assassinated in Tehran by the Forghan Fighters, an underground group that had killed General Vali Gharani on April 23. Motahari was leaving a dinner party at the home of Iran's Minister of Revolutionary Affairs at 10:20 in the evening, and was shot as he walked to his car. Sérgio Paranhos Fleury, 45, Brazilian law enforcement official and chief of the agency DOPS (Departamento de Ordem Política e Social or the Department for Political and Social Order), drowned before he could be tried.
May 2, 1979 (Wednesday) The Houston Angels won the first championship of the Women's Professional Basketball League (WPBL), the first pro basketball circuit for women, winning the fifth game of the best-3-of-5 series against the Iowa Cornets. Houston won the first two games, Iowa the second two, setting up the deciding game, which Houston won, 111 to 104 with Paula Mayo being the high scorer with 36 points. Died: Julius Kravitz, 67, American grocery chain executive and chairman of First National Supermarkets, was fatally wounded during a kidnapping attempt the day before in Shaker Heights, Ohio, a suburb of Cleveland. Kravitz was shot three times in the chest and once in the back by two men masquerading as police officers. Police arrested the former president of Multi-Chem Industries and another Multi-Chem employee.
May 3, 1979 (Thursday) Voting for the House of Commons took place in the UK and the Conservative Party won a 339-seat majority of the 635 Commons seats, making Margaret Thatcher the nation's first woman prime minister and ending the government of James Callaghan and the Labour Party. Among the candidates becoming MPs for the first time was future Prime Minister John Major, representing the County Huntingdonshire constituency, formerly occupied by David Renton, who departed Commons to take a seat in the House of Lords. The last U.S. Army soldier for the United States Taiwan Defense Command left the island of Taiwan. Ted Giannoulas, the originator of the oldest pro baseball team mascot, the "San Diego Chicken", was fired by radio station KGB-FM after five seasons of wearing the costume of what was originally called the "KGB Chicken". When San Diego Padre fans learned that another radio station employee had been substituted for Giannoulas, the replacement was booed off the field. After a successful lawsuit, Giannoulas returned in a different costume with a different mascot name, "The Famous Chicken", on June 29.