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 under which their people live".
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 who 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 at the Millions 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:
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.
BC columnist Conrad W. Worrill,
PhD, is the National Chairman of the National Black United Front
(NBUF).
Click
here to contact Dr. Worrill.