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One
of the critical demands of the Reparations Movement is the release of
African in America political prisoners. The issue of African in America
political prisoners often gets swept aside in our demands in the
Reparations Movement. This should not be. There are many sisters and
brothers who have sacrificed much for the liberation of African people
in America and are locked up unjustly in America's prisons and are
political prisoners. When we discuss political prisoners, we are
talking about “those persons harassed, arrested, framed, and imprisoned
because of their relatively peaceful political activity against the
destructive conditions that their people live under.”
The goal of our political prisoners has been “to transfer power from
the corrupt and racist business people, government officials, pseudo
intellectuals, policemen, judges, and jailers and keep them down to a
captive nation of people to be free.” We should all be aware that
Marcus Garvey, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., the Honorable Elijah
Muhammad, Sister Callie House, and Huey P. Newton spent time in jail
because they fought for our freedom, just as Brother Mumia Abu Jamal
remains a political prisoner for his uncompromising political
journalism.
The origin of the campaign that has resulted in the more than one
hundred women and men who are locked up in America’s prisons as
political prisoners, many of them African in Americans, is related to
the “secret war” that was waged against the Black Liberation Movement
by the FBI.
Former FBI Bureau Director J. Edgar Hoover, in the 1960s and 70s led
this campaign. This illegal and top- secret onslaught was called the
“Counterintelligence (COINTELPRO) program that targeted Black activists
and organizations.” Its goal was to disrupt, dismantle, discredit, and
neutralize Black groups and leaders, thus seriously crippling our
movement. They were successful.
That is why it is important for African people in America to join the
Reparations Movement and help rebuild the Black Liberation Movement.
One of our critical demands of the Reparations Movement must be the
freedom of our political prisoners and prisoners of war.
The Jericho Movement explains, “The issue of whether or not political
prisoners and prisoners of war exist inside the borders of the United
States of America is one that the government of the United States has
successfully been able to refute. They have been able to deny the
existence of political prisoners and prisoners of war because we have
not taken the battle to them and forced them to address this issue.”
We can begin publicly addressing the issue of our political prisoners,
in a massive way, on August 17th at the Million For Reparations Mass
Rally and ignite, educate, and inspire our people to expand the
Reparations Movement to include, as a key component, our political
prisoners.
In this context, the Jericho Movement further explains that there “are
brothers and sisters, men and women who, as a consequence of their
political work/or organizational affiliations were given criminal
charges, arrested or captured, tried in courts and sent to prison.
While trying them as criminals, the government maintained files on them
referencing their political activities, designed to insure they remain
in prison.” We must expose this tactic by the United States Government
in our demands that our political prisoners be freed.
The Reparations Movement must be more energetic in demanding and
calling for the release of our political prisoners and prisoners of war
that include Jalil Bottom, Charles Sims Africa, Debbi Sims Africa,
Herman Bell, Kojo Sababu, Lorenzo Stone Bey, Mark Cook, Mumia Abu
Jamal, Mutulu Shakur, Ojore Lutalo, Phil Africa, Richard Mafundi Lake,
Robert Seth Hayes, Sekou Kambui, and Jamil Abdullah AI- Amin.
It is only fitting that we remind ourselves that the Honorable Marcus
Garvey, was one of our first political prisoners targeted by the United
States Government, indicted on the trumped up charges of mail fraud and
convicted. The masses of our people in the mid-1920s demanded Garvey’s
release from prison. In 1927, more than 100,000 African people
demonstrated and protested that he be released. Garvey was released in
1927 and deported from the United States as a condition of his release.
Let’s free our political prisoners by joining the Reparations Movement and help intensify our demands for their release.
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BlackCommentator.com Columnist, Conrad W. Worrill, PhD, is the National Chairman Emeritus of the National Black United Front (NBUF). Contact Dr. Worrill and BC.
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 is published every Thursday |
Executive Editor:
David A. Love, JD |
Managing Editor:
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