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BULK RATE
U.S. Postage
St, Petersburg, Florida
Permit # 1242
Voice of the
International
African Revolution!
Volume 23, Number 2 • May 2003
African People’s Socialist Party • P.O. Box 11281 • St. Petersburg Fla • 33733-1281
$1.00/ £1
FREE JOHNNY
In 1992 a heroic 16-year-old African defeated a white lynch mob;
ten years later the African community continues to demand his freedom.
Inside:
Iraqi people refuse to submit
to colonial occupation
(page 6)
Imperialists try to use opposition
party to keep land in Zimbabwe
(page 12)
Nigerian elections continue
neo-colonial rule
(page 13)
Presentation on the people’s
resistance in Latin America
(Page 22)
2
THE BURNING SPEAR
May 2003
NATIONAL
Free Johnny Union!
In 1992 a heroic 16-year-old African defeated a white lynch mob;
ten years later the African community continues to demand his freedom.
BY SATEESH ROGERS
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — As a
part of a logical continuation of the
U.S. government’s war against the
African community, Johnny Union,
now almost 26-years-old, spends
every day and every night surrounded by the chilly walls of a
prison cell in brutal solitary confinement.
In 1992, Johnny was a young
man living inside the most heinous
and murderous system the world has
ever known. It was and is a system
that has had Africa and all of her people under attack for the past 500
years. This system, known as imperialism or white power, has resulted in
the murder of millions of Native
Americans, millions of Africans and
millions of people around the globe
from Panama to the Philippines, Viet
Nam to Iraq.
This system, which has made the
entire white world wealthy at the
expense of everyone else, enforces
its empire not simply by killing,
because that is not enough. It tortures and terrorizes those who it
feeds off. It was white power that
scalped the Native Americans and
sold the top of their heads to buyers
across the U.S. It was white power
that chopped off the hands of millions
of Africans in the "Belgian" Congo to
force them to provide rubber for the
car industry. It was white power that
hung Africans from one end of the
U.S. to the other, selling our body
parts as souvenirs to a bloodthirsty
white population.
So, when members of a white
lynch mob tried to lynch a group of
young Africans, as young as 13years-old on August 14, 1992 they
thought they were in for an easy "picnic," an easy pick-a-nigger.
After splashing recklessly over
curbs and barricades with their
ragged car, barely missing the children, the white lynch mob left to get
more vigilantes. This time rounding
up additional white thugs between
the ages of 25 and 30, armed with
baseball bats, lead pipes and steel
chains, they were prepared to go to
work on these children. The self-proclaimed "nigger knockers" had every
intention to murder these young
Africans who were absolutely
defenseless.
Meanwhile, the white girlfriend of
one of the African youth, whose
house they were visiting in this
neighborhood, called the police on
the white mob, hoping to avoid what
she apparently knew was the
inevitable mission of the "nigger
knockers."
A bloody free-for-all ensued as
the youths fought back with everything they had; throwing punches,
elbows, baby carriages and even
barbecue grills. One of the heroic
Africans, fighting for the survival of
African People’s Socialist Party
himself and his friends, stabbed
Ryan Fraser, one of the mob ringleaders.
Fraser, who was thought to be the
vandal who sprayed "Niggers Go
Home" on a nearby house, would
never have the opportunity to lead
any more lynch mobs to try and kill
African children. Nor would he be
able to commit any more dastardly
and it was absolutely and without
question the correct thing to do out of
self-defense. Had this mob succeeded, this article would be observing the upcoming anniversary of the
death of these young men, instead of
saluting their courageous act of
resistance to imperialist white power.
We must get our freedom fighter
Johnny Union out of the concentra-
What you can do!
We are calling on all freedom
loving people to write to
Johnny Union expressing your
solidarity:
Johnny Union
DC#140695
Florida State Prison m/u
7819 N.W. 228 St.
Raiford, FL 32026-1120
People who are interested in
supporting the campaign to
free Johnny Union should contact the INPDUM at:
1245 18th Ave. So.
St. Petersburg, FL 33705
email: [email protected]
or
call: 727-502-0575
Johnny Union (back left) has spent more than ten years of his life in prison
for defending himself and other children from white lynch mob.
acts of white power, because the
children whom he sought to murder
rose up and sent him to his grave.
Becoming frightened, the once
bold white mob ran away with their
tails between their legs — grown
men, upwards of 30 years of age,
defeated by a courageous group of
youthful Africans who were committed to survival by any means necessary.
Johnny told the other Africans to
leave as he waited for the police to
arrive. Johnny Union was arrested
and charged with first-degree murder, and sentenced as an adult at the
age of 16. Though he was not adult
enough to have a beer, and not adult
enough to have a cigarette, and not
even adult enough to go to a club, he
would be sentenced as an adult, to
an adult facility, by an all white jury.
Not one member of the white lynch
mob was ever arrested, charged or
tried.
The reality is that the stabbing of
Ryan Fraser was completely justified
Though he was
not adult enough
to have a beer, and
not adult enough
to have a cigarette,
and not even adult
enough to go to a
club, he would be
sentenced as an
adult, to an adult
facility, by an all
white jury. Not one
member of the
white lynch mob
was ever arrested,
charged or tried.
tion camp, because he did exactly
what any African should do facing
such terrorism.
Our brother, who defeated one
white lynch mob only to be sentenced to a quarter century by
another, needs the power of the people to fight and win this current battle.
This is a brawl that the people are
going to have to jump into in order
save our brother and deal a thousand blows to imperialist white
power. The state is trying to break
our brother; we have to break the
state.
During slavery, white slave masters would attempt to break the mind
and the will of Africans that they captured, hoping to extinguish the fire of
resistance that continually threatened white power and white wealth.
In the same way, the United States
and the prison system, operated by
the heirs of the slave masters,
attempt to do exactly the same thing
— prevent the rise of organized
resistance that would overturn imperialist white power. They attempt to
break the people’s will so that they
will believe this oppression will last
forever.
However, Johnny has not broken.
In fact, he fights harder and harder
for his freedom and survival each
passing day, just as he did eleven
years ago. The carefully crafted letters laying out legal strategy that he
writes to his family, including his
brother Leo who says that he owes
his life to Johnny, demonstrate his
ferocious will and his calculated
determination.
Despite being allowed only three
showers per week, he fights on.
see Johnny Union, page 20
May 2003
THE BURNING SPEAR
3
NATIONAL
OAKLAND — On April 6, 2003 the
Oakland Branch of the African
People’s Socialist Party held a forum
at the Uhuru House entitled “No
Black Blood for a White Man’s War.”
The forum united African leaders and
the African community to address the
unjust war on Iraq and the war on our
community, something the white-led
peace movement has consistently
ignored.
The African community must be
allowed to define the question of
peace. We can no longer allow the
white-left to define peace for us. The
forum gave testimony that there is a
need and desire for the African community to voice our opposition to the
unjust war on Iraq.
The forum was attended mostly
by Africans who had heard Chairman
Omali Yeshitela speak at an anti-war
rally the day before. This was an
anti-war rally organized by the white
left that fought to censor the Uhuru
Movement.
The Uhuru Movement had to
struggle fiercely, up until the time the
Chairman spoke, to be given three
minutes for him to speak. At every
planning meeting and through the
exchange of group e-mails, it was
crystal clear that the white-led peace
movement did not want to hear the
African community’s definition of
peace. They do not want to hear
about the daily war we are facing in
our community, a war that has been
waged on our community for hundreds of years. This war is waged by
way of the miseducation of our children, police brutality running rampant in our community, the imprisonment of 1 out of every 10 Africans,
the justice system stealing our
babies with their “foster care”, and
countless other ways we are
oppressed by the US government.
The forum featured the leader
and founder of the African People’s
Socialist Party as the keynote
speaker. Other speakers included
were Henry Clark, Chairman of the
West County Toxics Coalition; Willie
Ratcliff, the owner and editor of the
San Francisco Bay View Newspaper;
and Traivon, a local teacher, college
student and cultural artist.
The event was dedicated to Lil’
Bobby Hutton, a member of the
Black Panther Party who was murdered at the age of sixteen by the
Oakland Police Department thirty
five years ago. The Chairman
summed it up best when he said,
“We won’t settle for peace on the
plantation.” We will not support
peace rallies that support “peace on
the plantation.” We support the
courageous Iraqi people and their
struggle for freedom.
The African People’s Socialist
Party has a 14-point platform that
states “what we want, what we
believe.” Point 10 states, “We want
the right to build an African People’s
Willie Radcliff, owner and editor of the San Francisco Bay View Newspaper
Liberation Army. We believe that true
freedom, although often taken away,
cannot be given to a people. We
believe that African people are our
own liberators, and that we have a
right and obligation to build an
African People’s Liberation Army to
defend our political gains, our freedom fighters and communities, and
to win our actual freedom from our
oppressive colonial slave masters.
We believe that neither meaningful
freedom, nor guaranteed political
and social gains, nor genuine liberation are possible without the assuring
existence of an African People’s
Liberation Army. We believe further
that the only legitimate wars are wars
of national liberation, and wars to
oppose imperialist aggression, and
that therefore, the only legitimate military forces which defend liberty and
repel imperialist aggression. Such a
force would be the African People’s
Liberation Army.”
We have to continue to bring
organization to the fighting spirit of
the African community that the government has tried so hard to
smother. We have to prepare for the
continued battle we fight daily
against the attacks on our community.
Civil Libertarians deny support to Palestinian political
prisoner, Dr. Sami Al-Arian;
They want free speech for whom?
TAMPA, FL — Held without bail
since his arrest in February,
Palestinian rights advocate Dr. Sami
Al-Arian has so far been denied support or representation from the traditional white liberal civil libertarian
defenders of free speech. Dr. AlArian was one of eight Palestinian
patriots named in a 50-count indictment announced by U.S. Attorney
General John Ashcroft charging
them with "racketeering and conspiracy to provide support to terrorists".
Al-Arian's real crime has been his
refusal to be silent about the righteous struggle of the Palestinian people. An outspoken leader in his community, Al-Arian heads an Islamic
school in Tampa, Florida, has established Palestinian and Islamic educational groups and has participated in
public events opposing U.S. and
Israeli imperialist aggression in the
Middle East.
Judge Mark Pizzo refused to set
bail for Dr. Al-Arian, ruling that he will
remain incarcerated throughout his
trial, which is expected to last over a
year. Al-Arian is not a flight risk. His
family is in Tampa. The school that
Dr. Sami Al-Arian with his son and daughter
he runs is in Tampa. Following his
arrest, Al-Arian has been fired from
his tenured position as a computer
science professor at the University of
South Florida. He is appealing the firing, with the support of the American
Association of University Professors,
which has threatened to censure the
university for its disregard of Al-
Arian's rights. Meanwhile, Al-Arian
and his family are left with no income
and little resources. Where would he
go? As a displaced Palestinian, he
does not even have a country of his
own.
Dr. Al-Arian is attempting to organize a legal team and raise funds for
his own defense. Because he has
not yet been able to win competent
and supportive lawyers to represent
him in what promises to be an
expensive trial, he was assigned two
public defenders who have shown
disrespect and contempt for their
client. Al-Arian told the court he may
need to defend himself. When U.S.
District Judge James Moody said he
would likely provide "standby counsel" if Al-Arian defends himself,
Frank Louderback, one of his two
current court appointed lawyers,
remarked, "If he represents himself,
he needs Dr. Kevorkian, not me",
referring to the doctor who has
assisted in suicides.
Judge Thomas B. McCoun III
moved Al-Arian from Orient Road Jail
in Tampa to the maximum security
wing at Coleman Federal Prison,
three hours away from his family,
where Al-Arian and three of his codefendants appear to be the only
people held there without having
been convicted of anything.
Al-Arian is being held in solitary
confinement. He is continually stripsearched and has limited access to
see Al-Arian, page 21
4
THE BURNING SPEAR
May 2003
NATIONAL
San Francisco Police brutality:
ignored when it victimizes African community;
exposed when it touches white community
View district. These
attacks on Africans are
mandated by the
counter-insurgent practice of police containment, which is the
nationwide public policy
for black communities.
Two incidents shortly
before the beating of
the two whites clearly
illustrate this policy:
On the night of
January 20, 2002,
approximately 20 San
Francisco police officers
attacked four young
Africans. It was the
night of the Martin
Luther King Jr. holiday
and with no school the
following day, the youth
were hangin' out in their
Hunters Point/Bay View
neighborhood. As usual
Neo-colonial Chief Earl Sanders (center) and Deputy Chief Alex Fagan Sr. (right) both have
the police concocted a
histories of brutality against the African community, but only after the police beating of
phony pretext for their
two white people were they indicted.
action but the real reason for the attack is
SAN FRANCISCO — The San
stated clearly in Point #8 of the
Francisco Police Department
Working Platform of the African
(SFPD) is currently under unusual
People's Socialist Party: " the police
public scrutiny as a result of an inciare an occupying army of the State."
dent of police brutality. On the night
As word spread of the police
of November 20, 2002, three young
attack, parents came out to support
off-duty San Francisco police officers
and defend their children. The
led by Alex Fagan Jr. were returning
police, with guns drawn, threatened
from a night of drinking and celebratthe parents with being shot if they
ing with their peers. They stopped at
made any attempt to aid or assist
a local tavern and severely beat up
their children.
two citizens for no apparent reason.
The parents and other residents
The beating and the subsequent
were kept at a distance and forced
cover-up at the highest levels of the
to watch helplessly as their male
SFPD resulted in a significant grand
children were beaten and their
jury indictment on February 28,
female children were sexually
2003, against the police chief, three
assaulted by inappropriate "frisking
deputy chiefs, three command offiand searching." One resident made
cers and the three brutes who carit clear that the purpose of the inciried out the attack.
dent was "a show of force" and
Liberal District Attorney Terrance
intimidation.
Hallinan presented the case of the
As you can imagine, there was
attack and cover-up to the grand jury
no grand jury indictments and no
— made up of 19 citizens, half
criminal charges filed after these
appointed and half pulled from the
events even though the families
voter registration rolls — and
protested and filed complaints. It is
instructed them to do a thorough
now 15 months later, and the scaninvestigation. The grand jury interdal over the beating of two white citviewed and investigated over 42
izens and the subsequent grand jury
SF
police
officers
reprimanded
members of the SFPD from the lowindictments have created enough
because victims were white
est patrol officer to the police chief
democratic space for the just
This appears to be a serious
himself.
demand of the African families to be
response to the brutal attack, but
Their presumably thorough invesrecognized and acted upon.
after a long history of unfettered brutigation resulted in the indictments on
Consequently, five of the officers
tality by the SFPD, we have to ask
basically two counts. The three offiinvolved in the attack have now been
"Why, why now?" The two citizens
cers who carried out the assault
criminally charged.
who were attacked were white. As
were charged with felony assault.
The second illustrative incident of
did the German government dealing
The command officers were charged
normal anti-African police behavior
with Jewish citizens in the second
with felony conspiracy to cover-up
happened at Thurgood Marshall
imperialist war (WW2), Officer Alex
the incident and the mishandling of
High School. Thurgood Marshall,
Fagan Jr. and his drunken buddies
the investigation of the incident. The
also located in Hunters Point/ Bay
"crossed the line" by attacking fellow
cover-up occurred because Alex
View, has a predominantly African
whites.
Fagan Jr. is the son of the powerful
student body.
Like many SFPD officers, Officer
Deputy Chief Alex Fagan Sr. who
The school had a high academic
Alex Fagan Jr. "cut his teeth," as a
also has a history of misconduct.
standard, which was mandated by
patrolman, by brutalizing the African
Fagan Sr. was also indicted.
the black community. On October 11,
population of the Hunters Point/Bay
2002 a fight occurred on campus.
One of the white
police officers
involved and
charged with
brutalizing the
African youth on
Martin Luther King
Day alluded to this
plan when he said
"As long as you
[African] people
are here [in
Hunters Point] we
will act like this."
Sixty baton-wielding police
responded and created chaos and a
police riot. Many students were hit by
clubs. A police officer threatened one
student with his gun. The brave and
always struggling African youth confronted the police with their voices
and their unity. In this case, charges
were brought against some of the
students and one teacher. Eventually
the bogus charges were dropped,
but no charge was ever brought
against the SFPD.
Attacks on the SF black
community have historically
been a strategy of State
oppression.
For Burning Spear readers to
more clearly understand the context
of these events, a little San
Francisco history is necessary: In the
late1940’s, the SF Fillmore District
was a thriving commercial and cultural hub of the African community,
similar to Tulsa, Oklahoma and
Rosewood, Florida.
Approximately 20 years later, at
the height of the Black Power
Movement and during the political
reign of the Black Panther Party, the
Fillmore District was attacked by the
SF Redevelopment Agency and literally razed to the ground. For
decades the heart of the once thriving Fillmore District remained dozens
of empty weed-filled lots. Some of
the African community was dispersed out of San Francisco and
some concentrated in the Hunters
Point/Bay View neighborhood.
Hunters Point/Bay View has little
commercial activity beyond the usual
liquor stores and chicken houses.
However, it does have sunny
weather, easy access to downtown
and the recreational activities of the
SF Bay.
Consequently the City of San
Francisco, led by the neo-colonialist
Mayor Willie Brown, has a grand
plan to "redevelop" Hunters
Point/Bay View. One of the white
police officers involved and charged
with brutalizing the African youth on
Martin Luther King Day alluded to
this plan when he said "As long as
you [African] people are here [in
Hunters Point] we will act like this."
The SFPD has a long history of
violence against the Africans and the
colonized communities of SF. No
attack on the black community has
ever resulted in grand jury indictments. Indicted commanders —
Chief Earl Sanders, Deputy Chiefs
Suhr, Alex Fagan Sr. and Captain
Corrales — have long histories of
brutality and misconduct. Most
recently Deputy Chief Suhr has
authorized illegal spying on antiwar
demonstrators. For their various misdeeds, these men have all been promoted.
see SFPD, page 21
May 2003
THE BURNING SPEAR
5
INTERNATIONAL
U.S. and UK Massacre and Maim
thousands in Iraq
Just several days after George
Walker Bush declared victory following the bloody massacre mendaciously entitled "Operation Iraqi
Freedom," the Iraqi people resisted
U.S. gunfire with rocks and took to
the streets in protest across their
country.
For the most part, North American
and European media have worked
overtime to diminish and white-out
the reality of large numbers of Iraqi
dead. However, there have been
daily reports showing the grisly
destruction of human life over the
course of the U.S. massacre, which
has followed the deadly assaults of
more than a decade of economic
sanctions and bombings on the people of Iraq.
On April 14, the Pentagon
declared that it had no plans to determine how many Iraqi civilians may
have been killed or injured as a result
of U.S. military operations in Iraq.
International relief and human rights
organizations have attempted to
assess the damage done by U.S.
and UK troops. However, a full
assessment of the atrocities and
human rights violations committed by
U.S. and UK forces will not be possible until the Iraqi people have selfdetermination and true freedom.
Iraqi civilians have experienced
loss, not freedom, in the hands
of U.S. and UK troops
According to medical records in
Baghdad, 1,101 dead and
6,800 wounded civilians
passed through the 19 major
hospitals in the city between
March 19 and April 9, 2003.
Three hospitals near the
Baghdad airport — Al
Kharama, Al Askan and
Yarmuk — recorded 845
deaths of this count.
Estimates of close to
another thousand never
made it to hospitals and
were buried in graves dug
throughout the city in cemeteries, backyards, city parks
and mosque grounds,
including 150 graves that
were dug into the garden
Mutilated bodies of young Iraqi children brutally
around the Al Askan
Hospital.
In the city of Najaf, for example,
From media reports, an organizathe Najaf Teaching Hospital reported
tion called Iraq Body Count project
that it had treated 286 civilian dead
(www.iraqbodycount.net) has
during the war compared to 57 militracked between 3760 and 4795
tary deaths. As many as 62 people
civilian deaths. The International
were reported killed by a bomb that
Committee of the Red Cross mainwas dropped on a Baghdad market
tains that Baghdad hospitals, amidst
on March 28 by U.S. planes. In just
water and power shortages, are
one publicized instance, we learned
overwhelmed with wounded people.
that 12 year old Ali Ismail Abbas, was
Despite the U.S. insistence that it
orphaned, lost both arms and sufonly attacked "legitimate" military tarfered burns to 20 percent of his body
gets, the killing of Iraqi people who
during the bombing of Baghdad.
were non-combatants was rampant.
Two pregnant women were killed
Calculations of the number of the
when a U.S. tank shelled their ambudead have not been made in many of
lance on the way to Yarmuk Hospital
Iraq's cities, but available information
on April 7, doctors reported. The driindicates that hundreds of civilians
ver and the accompanying physician
died during the U.S. assault.
were both injured. Soon afterward,
massacred by U.S. troops
shells hit the hospital's diabetes center, destroying an entire floor which
volunteer workers have been working to repair since.
After a taxi-driver was alleged to
have detonated a bomb, killing himself and four U.S. troops at an army
checkpoint near Najaf, U.S. soldiers
began firing on cars and indiscriminately killing families trying to escape
the fighting.
U.S. atrocities denounced
internationally
Amnesty International's April 8
statement condemned "the mounting
toll of civilian casualties in Iraq and
see Massacre, page 7
The political economy of the invasion
and re-colonization of Iraq
After five weeks of relentless
mayhem, destruction and murder
against the Iraqi people, the U.S.
government quickly declared the
"war" stage of "Operation Iraqi
Freedom" completed. The Bush
regime then promised the world a
U.S. occupation of Iraq that will last
at least one year and probably much
longer.
A backdrop to this proclamation
are daily militant, anti-U.S. demonstrations staged by Iraqis in every
city in their nation. These demonstrations have been met with deadly
shootings by U.S. mercenaries on
the ground. The people of Iraq have
not only been undeterred by these
attacks, but have engaged in
guerilla-style resistance, successfully taking out some of their invaders
with car bombs, sniper rifles and
concealed small arms at close range.
This current dynamic underscores
the transparent lies of the Bush
regime, that still desperately
attempts to justify its crimes based
on the need to "liberate the Iraqi people." This empty rhetoric is wasted
on all but the staunchest imperialist
pundits.
It is clear. The invasion of Iraq has
only been motivated by one thing: a
The Pentagon has paid nearly
$90 million to a subsidiary of the
well-connected Halliburton Co. to
cater to U.S. personnel occupying
Iraq. Dick Cheney was Halliburton's
chief executive officer for five years
until he resigned in August 2000 to
be George W. Bush's running mate.
The Defense Department gave
Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg Brown
& Root (KBR) exclusive rights to the
"catering" job of "post-war Iraq." This
has included fixing up an extravagant
presidential palace being used by the
Americans under a broad U.S.
Army logistics contract that pays the
company a fee based on a percentage of everything it spends, according to Pentagon documents and
Halliburton’s corporate filings.
In addition, an April 10, 2003 government contract awarded the
Halliburton Co. subsidiary to fight oil
well fires in Iraq is worth at least $7
billion over two years. The contract
also allows KBR to earn another 7
percent in profit, valued at $490 million.
In Baghdad, personnel from KBR
currently occupy both the Republican
Halliburton and KBR
U.S. soldiers count a portion of the $4
Iraqi bank.
desperate attempt by the U.S. government to revitalize the reeling U.S.
and world economy. While hoping to
generate capital for specific corporations directly tied to key players in
the Bush regime, the Bush regime
also sees the political economy of
colonialism as the solution to the
general economic chaos afflicting
U.S. society.
The U.S. government has devised
a grand scheme to pay U.S. corporations to rebuild Iraq using Iraqi
money. It has petitioned the UN to
million dollars they looted from an
allow U.S. control over Iraqi money
and oil revenues under a law called
the Occupying Powers Act. This is
an insidious scheme. U.S. corporations are paid by U.S. tax payers to
destroy Iraq and then paid by the
Iraqi economy to rebuild Iraq.
The primary corporate beneficiaries of this scheme are those directly
connected to the current Bush
administration as well as the former
Bush administration and the Reagan
administration.
see Invasion, page 7
6
THE BURNING SPEAR
May 2003
INTERNATIONAL
Iraq’s New Rulers
The people refuse to submit to U.S. installed rulers
After its bloodbath in Iraq, the
of that oil England needed a "regime
when the British used poison gasses
resources. U.S. occupying troops are
U.S. government’s attempt to impose
change." In 1914 during the First
and massive bombings against the
greeted with chants of "U.S. go
open colonial rule is mired in probImperialist War, the war to re-divide
Iraqis. A year later Iraqi unrest forced
home," and even potshots at sollems as the Iraqi people seethe in
the world among the white rulers,
England to install a neo-colonial
diers. American forces have shot and
anger over their new American overBritain formed an army of colonial
Uncle Tom puppet, King Feisel,
killed more than a dozen demonstraseers.
tors as they expressed
As The Burning
the freedom of speech
Spear goes to press,
that the U.S. claimed to
the situation is emergbe bringing to Iraqis.
ing daily, the result of a
On May 6, U.S.
bitter feud being played
George
President
out
between
the
Walker
Bush
Department of Defense
announced his new
and
the
State
civilian "special envoy"
Department, all at the
to Iraq, Lewis Paul
expense of enormous
Bremer III. Bremer ’s
Iraqi suffering.
post follows weeks of
The U.S. governthe internal imperialist
ment now admits that
battle between the milimore than a month after
tary and the State
Coalition Forces seized
Department over who
the oil-rich country, the
would best serve U.S.
"task of quickly regovernment and corpoestablishing order and
rate interests.
civil administration in
The
plans
of
Iraq was far more
Bechtel, vice president
daunting than U.S. offiCheney’s Haliburton
cials had planned for,"
and all the leeches
according to the St.
ready to suck the blood
Petersburg Times. With
of the Iraqi people
chaos, anarchy and
through the multi-billion
Iraqi resistance domidollar "reconstruction"
Masses of Iraqi people protest in constant demonstrations demanding that the brutal U.S. government and
nating the situation in
process will be well proits coalition of imperialist lackies end the occupation of their country.
Baghdad,
U.S.
tected by the U.S. powappointees as colonial
ers. Claiming that a miloverseers in Iraq are being installed
itary government would be "more
subjects from India to invade Iraq.
whose family served the imperialists
and sent home with lightning speed.
efficient and effective," the
England claimed it was going to "libwell until the Baath Party took over in
Department of Defense had previerate" Iraq from the Turks who had
a coup in 1958.
Imperialist history repeats
ously installed retired General Jay
dominated the country for 400 years.
Under the British, Kuwait was
itself
Garner to supervise the "clean up" of
The British miscalculated their
separated from Iraq, much to the
A hundred years ago England had
the U.S. destruction in Iraq. Garner
strength though. The Turks kicked
anger of the Iraqi people. The counso many countries around the world
the English asses in Baghdad where
try was partitioned into 3 areas, crewas directly responsible to Defense
under its iron hand of colonial terror
most of the English colonial army
ating divisions between the Sunnis,
Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
that it boasted of a British Empire on
was killed or captured. In 1917 the
Shias and Kurds, and setting the
However, according to one newspawhich the "sun never set." The peoper report, "it did not make sense for
English returned with an army of
stage for the current situation. This 3that process to be handled by
way partition is being used again by
General Garner because it would
U.S. forces today.
appear to many people that the
Iraqi resistance greeted with
resulting government was a puppet
death and repression
of the American military."
In what seems like an American
Thus Garner was quickly replaced
remake of a bad English movie, the
by Bremer, whose post as head of
United States, the current leader of
the "Office of Humanitarian and
Western imperialism, is repeating
Reconstruction Assistance" is suphistory in its lust for oil and strategic
posed to last only until the end of
control of the middle east at the
May when the U.S. plans to install its
expense of the oppression of the
neo-colonial government in
Arab people.
Baghdad. Most media pundits
After the "Desert Storm" invasion
assume the new Iraqi regime will be
of Iraq in 1991, and the continued
set up or even headed up by the
bombing and forced starvation of the
vicious CIA-backed Zalmay
Iraqi people through economic sancKhalizad.
tions which killed more than half a
Imperialist henchmen
million Iraqi children, the U.S.
Regardless of which branch of the
invaded again on March 20 of this
School children in Falluja, Iraq write anti-U.S. slogans on the blackboard durU.S.
government appointed them, all
year. They did this despite militant
ing a student protest.
those
lined up to take over the reins
opposition from millions of people
in
Iraq
are seasoned imperialist crimaround the world and inside this
ple of Africa, India, Asia and Pacific
"overwhelming force" and drove the
inals.
A
retired diplomat and "councountry. U.S. "Operation Iraqi
Islands were enslaved, impoverished
Turks out of Iraq. They installed
terterrorism
expert," Bremer worked
Freedom," with its "shock and awe"
and on their knees to feed wealth,
British military and civilian overseers
for
[Henry]
Kissinger Associates
strategy easily overwhelmed a famresources and power to the white
called viceroys, colonial rulers who
before
becoming
the new American
ished, exhausted, disarmed and disworld. As industry and transportation
used terror to suppress the people in
viceroy
in
Iraq.
Bremer
was "ambasorganized people in only 3 weeks, to
emerged under this parasitic imperiorder that oil and resources could be
sador
at
large
for
counterterrorism"
the surprise of no one.
alist system, oil became an essential
easily stolen and sent to the imperiunder Ronald Reagan, is a close
Nevertheless, the imperialist masingredient for the growth of capitalalist masters.
friend of Deputy of Defense Paul
ism.
ters again face angry resistance from
The Arabs of Iraq refused to subWolfowitz, "in large part because he
the Iraqi people who are making it
The world’s largest oil reserves
mit to their new rulers, however, and
has taken hawkish positions on fightvery clear that only the people of Iraq
are in Iraq, the site of the ancient civin 1920 they organized a widespread
ilization of Mesopotamia. To get hold
should control the country and its
rebellion that was only put down
see Iraq, page 19
May 2003
THE BURNING SPEAR
Massacre
continued from page 5
the reported use of cluster bombs by
U.S. forces in heavily populated
areas," and cited it as "a breach of
international humanitarian law."
Video footage taken at Al-Hilla's
hospital in Bagdad was judged by
Reuters and Associated Press to be
too terrible to show on television. The
footage showed bodies of the men,
women and children ripped apart
with shards of shrapnel from cluster
bombs. Independent journalists
reported that the pictures showed
babies cut in half and children with
their limbs blown off. Two trucks full
of bodies, including women in flowered dresses, were seen outside the
hospital.
Doctors from Medical Aid for the
Third World cited "a human catastrophe in Iraq." On April 16, they issued
a statement reporting the following:
"We have seen hundreds of civilians, including many children, injured
and killed, often by prohibited
weapons such as cluster bombs. We
have seen how ambulances and
civilian cars have been hit by U.S.
troops.
Invasion
Palace and the Babel Tourist Hotel,
two renowned, opulent sites in Iraq.
To provide janitorial and garbage services to them, the newly formed,
London-based Iraq Project &
Business Development Co. pulls
labor from the desperate and starving Iraqi population. Iraqis are carefully screened by the IPBDC, then
hired to mop floors and clean
latrines, used by KBR personnel, for
$2 a day.
On April 17 the U.S. Agency for
International Development (USAID)
awarded a $680 million contract to
San Francisco-based Bechtel Corp.,
a private company with close ties to
the Bush administration.
The areas covered by the contract include the rehabilitation of
Iraq’s power, water and sewage systems that were destroyed in the
bombing campaign, rehabilitation of
airports, and the dredging of the
Umm Qasr port. Bechtel’s future
work in the country will also likely
include repair and reconstruction of
hospitals, schools, government
buildings and irrigation and transportation systems.
Bechtel stands to gain much more
than the initial contract. USAID officials have indicated that the final
price tag will run into the tens of billions of dollars. Much of this work
(which includes operations in nearly
every important area of the country’s
infrastructure) will go to Bechtel and
its subcontractors.
The ties between Bechtel and the
Bush regime run deep. George
Shultz served as the president of
Bechtel for seven years, in between
his posts as Nixon’s treasury secretary and Reagan’s secretary of state.
After leaving government, Shultz
again joined Bechtel, taking a seat
on the company’s board of directors,
a post he still holds today. Shultz
Bechtel
the
Geneva
"We have
Conventions."
experienced
They supported
how patients
the initiative to
and
health
U.S.
"bring
workers had difGeneral Tommy
ficulties passing
Franks
and
U.S. military
other U.S. and
checkpoints
British military
and reaching
authorities and
medical facilipersonnel
ties.
before a court of
"We
now
justice to make
see how the
them answer for
Iraqi civilian
their violations of
hospitals and
international
other medical
humanitarian
facilities are
law."
plundered and
neglected.
An Iraqi man lies in hosital bed
Iraqi loss
"Many Iraqi
injured after U.S. soldiers massacred
extends way
health profesat least 13 people for demonstrating.
beyond
sionals can no
longer report to
statistics
work. Without electricity, safe water
The extent of human suffering as
supply and the provision of media result of 43 days of relentless
cines and other medical supplies,
bombing cannot be measured in
many patients are simply left to die."
numbers. Between March 19 and
This organization of doctors
April 9, U.S. and UK troops killed
accused the U.S. and British troops
journalists, bombed medical clinics
of "grossly and repeatedly violating
and markets and destroyed homes,
international humanitarian law –
government buildings, and infraArticles 10, 12, 15, 21, 35, 36, 41, 45,
structures necessary for daily life.
47, 48 and 51 of Protocol I addition to
They maimed children, destroyed
chairs the advisory board of the
Committee for the Liberation of Iraq,
a right-wing outfit that was critical in
manufacturing a justification for the
war.
Jack Sheehan, a Bechtel senior
vice president, is also a member of
Rumsfeld's advisory board, the
Defense Policy Board (DPB). Other
members of the Defense Policy
Board have included Richard Perle,
a vociferous advocate of war in Iraq
and the U.S.'s current pre-emptive
strike foreign policy. Perle was forced
to resign as chairman of the DPB
when conflicts of interest charges
relating to his connection with
telecommunications giant Global
Crossing were made in May.
Sheehan is responsible for
Bechtel’s petroleum and chemical
operations, and oversees the execution and strategy for the company’s
activities in the Middle East, Europe,
Africa and Southwest Asia. He is a
retired U.S. army general who
served as commander-in-chief of
U.S. Atlantic Command until 1997.
He also served as a special advisor
for Central Asia in the Clinton administration.
Bechtel’s chairman and CEO,
Riley Bechtel, was appointed by
Bush to the Export Council, which
advises the president on international trade issues. Caspar
Weinberger was Bechtel’s general
counsel from 1975 to 1981, before
joining the Reagan administration as
secretary of defense.
Along with the overt economic
benefits of Bechtel and private equity
firms are behind-the-scenes firms
profiteering from the colonization of
Iraq. The Carlyle Group is one of
them.
Private equity companies buy
undervalued businesses and then
resell them for a profit. It is a highly
profitable field open to only the
wealthiest players. It has returned an
average profit of 34 percent per year
over the past decade.
The Carlyle Group
The Carlyle Group became a
major force on the world financial
scene by employing prominent exofficeholders, such as former
President George Bush, to provide a
foot in the door to government ministries around the world. Along with
Bush Sr., the Carlyle Group has
employed former Secretary of State
James Baker, former Secretary of
Defense Frank Carlucci, and Former
British Prime Minister John Major.
Even more intriguing is that the bin
Laden family was an investor in
Carlyle.
Carlyle also has direct links to the
Saudi royal family and has been
directly involved in training Saudi
troops to protect oil fields. It also
helped build Saudi Arabia's national
guard from 26,000 to over 70,000
troops. The link between Carlyle and
Saudi Arabia is so strong that some
have called Carlyle a "front" organization for the Saudi royal family.
Since the September 11 attacks,
the Carlyle Group has reaped millions of dollars from government contracts on things such as cleaning up
anthrax-infected buildings, including
the Hart Senate Office Building, making X-ray scanners, providing logistics support to the U.S. military, making metal-bond structures in fighter
jets and missiles, and providing
employee background checks for the
government.
But, while "Corporate America" is
the easy target, the collective wealth
of white people of all classes will also
benefit. All of the weapons used to
destroy Iraq, and all the supplies
used to rebuild Iraq are produced by
workers inside the U.S.
Cheap gasoline and oil prices,
which have plummeted since Bush's
victory declaration, reach into all sectors of the economy. This brings
down the cost of energy and transportation that are required to transfer
all products and services throughout
the U.S. economy.
Besides cheap gas and a job pro-
The General U.S. Economy
7
families, and stood by while the
ancient relics of the Iraqi National
Museum were demolished and pillaged.
In the weeks following April 9
when the U.S. took control of
Baghdad, Iraqis were killed and
injured at the rate of several dozen
per day through gunfire. In the days,
weeks, months, and years to come
the Iraqi people will suffer the result
of a demolished infrastructure,
unclean water, and the resulting
endemic of diarrhea and diseases
like typhoid. This is the misery that
comes as a result of U.S. terror and
direct colonial rule.
However, as the U.S. occupation
continues, so will the resistance of
the Iraqi people to colonial domination. In Mosul, U.S. troops stopped
giving out candy to children who
were increasingly throwing rocks at
them. In the same protest in Falujah
that killed 15 protesters, a banner
read, "Sooner or Later U.S. Soldiers,
We'll Kick You Out."
Charge the U.S. and the UK
with War Crimes!
Self-Determination and
Reparations to the Iraqi People!
Uhuru!
ducing the materials for destroying
and rebuilding Iraq, the military itself
provides a boost to the economy. It
is a jobs program for those unable to
find meaningful work and education
in the private sector. The military
recruitment program is particularly
aggressive and vicious against
domestically colonized Africans and
Indigenous/Raza people. Military
recruiters comb schools with colonized people preying on African and
other young people, who are confronted with leaving high school with
virtually no employment opportunities outside of the illegal drug economy and fast food chains.
The military also provides jobs for
those in the private sector producing
all the materials that the military
needs.
Recently, the resistance of the
Saudi Arabian people resulted in the
destruction of a luxurious housing
compound thought by the foreign, i.e.
non-Saudi, residents to be impenetrable. The specific residents targeted were U.S. citizens employed
by the Vinnell Corporation. Vinnell
is a subsidiary of the weapons of
mass destruction manufacturer
Northrup-Grumman, and is partly
owned by the Saudi government.
Vinnell trains the Saudi National
Guard. It is a company of private
soldiers.
These U.S. citizen mercenaries of
the Vinnell Corporation receive their
wages and salary tax free. Vinnell is
probably one of many corporations
offering U.S. citizens employment
overseas in the context of colonial
domination of other nations.
Clearly, all the benefits to the U.S.
economy identified so far are only
short term. Ultimately, all of these
"benefits" will result in the degradation and destruction of the lives, environment and well-being of the benefactors of U.S.-led world capitalism.
This is simply a of law dialectical
materialism. As Malcolm X said, "the
chickens always come home to
roost."
8
THE BURNING SPEAR
May 2003
BUILD TO WIN!!
The Treasure of an Uncompromising Voice
Anti-war demonstration held in Philadelphia by the International People’s
Democratic Uhuru Movement
BY OBI EGBUNA
This article is an honest and sincere attempt to analyze the role of
our community in today's anti-war
movement. There are some concerns and criticisms that must be
raised. As a full time grass roots
organizer for the last 13 years, it is
easy to see where the confusion and
frustration from each sector of our
community begins.
The two most decorated traditions
in our community are the church and
the military, and it appears as if, at
times, the military is held in higher
regard.
When the Truman Administration
made the decision to desegregate
the military, advocates of integration
hadn’t the slightest idea of the psychological damage this political
maneuver would have on our people.
Since then those who have
proudly served in the United States
wars, operations and invasions have
developed a very influential network
right before our very eyes that continues to attempt to convince each
coming generation that serving in the
military of their ancestor's slave masters is their patriotic duty.
They are also the driving force
behind initiatives like the building of
the African-American Civil War
Museum on U Street in Washington,
DC and the building of a statue honoring the Buffalo Soldiers in Fort
Leavenworth, Kansas. They created
a magazine like the Bronze Warrior,
which claims to be the nation's premier information source for ethnic
and cultural diversity in the U.S.
Military.
One cannot understand the mentality of Colin Powell or Condoleeza
Rice, without looking at Crispus
Attucks, Peter Salem, the only
female Buffalo Soldier — Cathy
Williams, Dorie Miller and Benjamin
O. Davis to name a few. They belong
to a long list of people who have
fallen for U.S. military propaganda,
hook, line and sinker.
The pro-military machine in our
community is very well organized
and should never be taken for
granted. This is why those of our
organizations who oppose the military strategies and tactics of the U.S.
government should be far more consistent.
There has been more outrage
and protest over the Bush
Administration threatening to bomb
Iraq, than there was of the Clinton
Administration actually bombing Iraq
for 70 days in a row. This forces any
critically thinking person to wonder if
the main reason for certain activists
raising their voices at this time is to
deliver the African vote to the
doorsteps of the democratic party in
the next presidential election.
If this is the case, we cannot be
surprised to see organizations who
do not have a sentimental attachment to either the democratic or
republican party deliberately isolated
from the planning of recent demonstrations, teach ins, and rallies where
our communities have been the target and focus.
Our brother Nelson Mandela
recently attacked Bush at a Women's
Forum in Africa for his stance on
Iraq. As a result, he has received
praise worldwide. We humbly suggest the next time he is in Bill
Clinton's company discussing AIDS
he launches the same attack so he
doesn't appear sweet on white liberals.
This is what made the activities of
the
Student
Non
Violent
Coordinating Committee and
Southern Christian Leadership
Conference in the Anti-War movement of the 1960's around Vietnam
more courageous — they refused to
be either intimidated or manipulated
by the Democratic President Lyndon
Johnson and his liberal counterparts.
We can also learn from the
Palestinian People whose resistance
against the Zionist State of Israel
never waivers one bit whether the
Labor or Likud party is in power.
Our people also face another
important challenge at this juncture
in history. We must understand the
difference between claiming we are
against war and opposing military
repression and violence.
For example, at the height of anticolonial movement in Africa, armed
struggle in places like Algeria,
Mozambique, Kenya, Angola and
Eritrea were necessary for independence to be won. The people of
Cuba and Vietnam also chose this
path with courage and dignity.
Therefore, today, when poor and
oppressed people all over the world
adopt these methods against brutal
and repressive regimes and mercenary units who in many cases
receive financial and military backing
from the United States, it is important
to refrain from criticizing them.
We must not serve as an
extended mouthpiece of the U.S.
government and its military and intelligence apparatus. It is also obvious
that homeland security and other legislation that deals with countries and
organizations labeled terrorists by
the U.S. are nothing but desperate
attempts to prevent organizers within
U.S. borders from building stronger
bridges with the people of Cuba,
Libya, Iraq, Zimbabwe, Colombia,
Palestine, Venezuela, North Korea,
Northern Island, Puerto Rico, Japan,
the Philippines and Afghanistan.
This way, instead of building a
worldwide movement against military
repression and violence and maximizing our potential, we will settle for
watered down declarations of peace
while the most ruthless military on
the planet earth gains momentum by
“You might not have the Black
Panther Party, but you
Therefore, today,
when poor and
oppressed people
all over the world
adopt these
methods [of armed
struggle] against
brutal and
repressive regimes
and mercenary
units who in many
cases receive
financial and
military backing
from the United
States, it is
important to
refrain from
criticizing them.
the second. We can no longer be
satisfied by dealing with this issue on
the surface. It no longer is enough for
our organizations to take positions
on wars, operations and invasions of
the U.S. government if you don't
have a program of action confronting
this problem, which simply means it
must not be that much of a priority.
I raise this contradiction for two
reasons. First, our organizations
have taken the most courageous
positions against the military activity
see Opinion, page 20
you have The Burning Spear.
they really haven't done
have the Uhuru House.
anything by crushing
You might not have
one organization.”
The Black Panther
newspaper,
So
- Huey P. Newton
but
The Burning Spear
P.O. Box 11281
St. Petersburg Fla 33733
727-821-6620
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April 2003
THE BURNING SPEAR
9
WE ARE THE
AFRICAN PEOPLE’S
SOCIALIST PARTY
Basic Line of the
AFRICAN PEOPLE’S
SOCIALIST PARTY
“All our work is guided by our understanding that
our struggle for national liberation within U.S.
borders is an integral part of the whole African
Liberation Movement; that the African Liberation
Movement itself is a part of the great contest
between the ever-emerging forces of international
socialism and the dying, but not yet dead forces of
imperialism; that the particular character of the
African Liberation Movement within the U.S. is a
struggle against U.S. domestic colonialism; that
the destruction of colonialism, led by a conscious
black revolutionary socialist party, will constitute
the critical blow in the struggle for socialism with-
RULES OF PARTY DISCIPLINE
At the June 2, 1974 Central Committee meeting the following
rules were drafted so that Party members would have a guide to
develop and strengthen our discipline.
ANY PARTY MEMBER WHO:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10
11.
Does not consciously strive to elevate his or her political
understanding has broken Party discipline;
Does not strive to unite our Party with the masses has broken Party discipline;
Reveals Party business without authorization has broken
Party discipline;
Discusses a Party member negatively to non-Party members
has broken Party discipline;
Exploits or oppresses African women through action or
statement has broken Party discipline;
Exploits or oppresses African people through action or
statement has broken Party discipline;
Fails to initiate constructive criticism or self-criticism has
broken Party discipline;
Uses words or actions to divide the Party has broken Party
discipline;
Refuses to recognize and follow Party leadership through
words or actions has broken Party discipline;
Discards or weakens Party leadership as opposed to
strengthening Party leadership has broken Party discipline;
Helps to divide and circumvent international African unity
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
through words or actions has broken Party discipline;
Uses criticism to divide and not unite the Party has broken
Party discipline;
Uses criticism or self-criticism on a personal level and not
a political level has broken Party discipline;
Uses criticism or self-criticism to hide her or his own shortcomings has broken Party discipline;
Does not carry himself worthy of emulation by the masses
has broken Party discipline;
Displays arrogance through actions or words has broken
Party discipline;
Displays negativism and reluctance in carrying out Party
tasks has broken Party discipline;
Does not strive to bring more Africans into the Party or
Party organizations has broken Party discipline;
Engages in adventurous and individualistic acts has broken
see NPDUM, page
10
THE BURNING SPEAR
May 2003
AFRICA
Manifesto
of the
African People of the World
Resolution from the Conference to Build the African
African people throughout the
world are rising up. We have entered
into the new millennium in motion,
struggling to overturn the 500 year
legacy of oppression and exploitation
to which we have been subjected by
a parasitic social system born at our
expense.
We are fighting to reclaim our
destiny as a single people whose
forced dispersal in a world defined by
artificial borders has served to undermine our common identity and dilute
our collective strength.
We are everywhere! We are in
Chicago, Illinois; in Florida, Texas,
California and New York in the
United States within North America,
as well as Toronto and Montreal in
Canada. We are in Brasilia in Brazil,
Caracas in Venezuela, Bluefields in
Nicaragua, in Central and South
America. We are in Trinidad, Haiti,
Jamaica, Guadeloupe, Martinique,
Dominica, the Bahamas, Cuba,
Puerto Rico, the Dominican
Republic, Barbados and all the
islands of the Caribbean.
We
are
in
London,
Birmingham,
Manchester,
Liverpool and Nottingham in
England. We are in Paris, Lille,
Lyons, Marseilles and Nice in
France. We are in Brussels,
Belgium; Amsterdam, Holland;
Berlin, Germany; Rome, Italy; as
well as Spain, Portugal, Russia,
Turkey and all of Eastern Europe.
We reside in the hundreds of
millions in our ancient Motherland
which was the birthplace of
humankind more than 150,000 years
ago and which served as the cradle
of human civilization more than
10,000 years ago.
The life and historical experience
of our people over the last 500 years
constitute the primary force, which
has given shape to the modern
world. It is a world where the vast
majority of the people of the planet
Earth are living in starvation, misery,
disease, ignorance and terror. At the
same time, Europe and North
America control the world's wealth at
gunpoint and rest upon the prostrate,
bloody and abcessed backs of the
workers and peasants of Africa, Asia
and Latin America.
The world capitalist economy
began with Europe's assault on Our
Africa and the kidnapping, captivity,
colonial enslavement and dispersal
of African people throughout what is
now known as the Americas.
This barbaric assault upon African
people depopulated our Motherland
of hundreds of millions of human
beings. It destroyed our ancient civilization and it unleashed a European
wave of mass murder that killed hundreds of millions of human beings
through slave raiding wars.
It left a trail of human carnage
over the Middle Passage of the
Atlantic Ocean and condemned the
captive African people of the
Americas to death through torture,
miserable toil and cultural annihilation.
This initial assault upon Africa,
along with the genocidal extermination of the indigenous peoples of the
Americas and the looting of Asia and
the Middle East has lifted Europe out
of millennia of disease, poverty, fratricidal warfare and mass murder.
Europe's militarism
and aggression
was a part of
a culture
whose
econ o m i c
base
was
built upon warfare
and conquest between
competing European tribes and kingdoms. Before this, there was no concept of Europe or white people as a
monolithic group. Europe's nationstates and continental unity were
forged through its assault upon the
world's peoples.
This unity was consolidated
through the conquest, invasion,
enslavement of the peoples of Asia
and the carving up of the African
Continent by European colonial powers in the 19th Century.
Today, one billion African people
throughout the world are engaged in
a desperate struggle for survival
within a world whose economic foundations were built through the theft of
our labor and resources.
African people comprise half of
the world's population that live on
less than two dollars a day. We are
subjected to genocidal biological
warfare through the use of AIDS,
Ebola and other often curable diseases, some of which are manufactured for our destruction.
Today our Motherland is undergoing a frenzy of rape and looting more
intense and insidious than slavery.
This takes the form of trade and socalled debt, which brings development to Europe, North America and
increasingly Japan, while it commits
mass murder against our people
through artificial famine and the
transformation of our homeland into
an economic wasteland.
However, we
continue to
struggle
and we
will
win!
The
historical
experience of
African people
throughout the world has
forged our people into a revolutionary nation comprised primarily of
workers and poor peasants. We continue to form the critical army of labor
for world imperialism in the mines of
Congo, South Africa and Zambia; in
the plantations and farms of Ghana,
the Ivory Coast, the Caribbean; in
the factories of Detroit, Manchester,
Lyons and Brussels, as well as the
hundreds of prison dungeons
throughout the world, including those
that hold one million African people
captive in the United States of North
America.
Included among this massive
force of African workers are the hundreds of millions of unemployed
African laborers who constitute a
massive reserve of labor pool for
imperialism. Hunger and starvation
are used as weapons of economic
warfare aimed at suppressing the
value of African labor power.
Moreover, this labor force is to work
day and night and to migrate from
country-to-country and continent-tocontinent just to eat.
The laws that govern nature and
the entire universe necessitate life,
and death and determine the rise of
the new and the vanquishing of the
old in an infinitely unfolding struggle
between opposing forces. In the
same way we know
that the resurrection of
Africa and
African
people is
inevitable
it
and
cannot be
stopped.
T h e
liberation
of Africa will be
brought about through
the coming worldwide
upheaval of African
workers and poor peasants — a sleeping giant
poised to seize our freedom, happiness and wealth from imperialist
white power and deal it the death
blow the world's people are awaiting Africa to strike.
While Our Africa has been formally freed from direct colonial rule
and European domination, it suffers
from an oppressive system that in
fact maintains the domination of its
former masters, often in partnership
with a consortium of imperialist economic and financial interests based
in the United States, Europe and
Japan.
During the 1950s and 1960s, a
mass revolutionary upsurge took the
world by storm. This revolutionary
motion was many times expressed in
the mobilization of armed African
worker and peasant resistance in
Africa.
African people forever defeated
the tyranny of direct white colonial
rule and domination. However, our
victory was incomplete, for our
movements succeeded only in
defeating the open imperialist rule
known as "colonialism". The hidden
indirect form of imperialist rule, called
"neo-colonialism" by Kwame
Nkrumah, has reduced Africa and
her people to a state of destitution
and desperation not seen since the
destruction and genocidal mass murder of the Slave Trade or the colonial
wars of conquest unleashed by
Europe during the late 19th Century.
The agents of neo-colonialism —
the extension of enemy power into
the ranks of our own nation through-
see Manifesto, page 12
May 2003
THE BURNING SPEAR
11
AFRICA
Kenyan elections serve to maintain status quo:
Moi’s KANU Legacy massively rejected
BY NZELA KINSHASA
The December 27, 2002 elections
in Kenya, won by Mwai Kibaki, the
leader of the National Alliance
Rainbow Coalition (NARC) ended
the 24 years of tyrannical and corrupt
rule of Arap Moi’s Kenyan African
National Union (KANU).
Despite Moi’s monopoly access to
the State media and other means of
communication, intimidation and brutalization of his opponent’s supporters, the December election results
showed the profound rejection of the
KANU rule, by our people in Kenya.
KANU’s presidential candidate,
Uhuru Kenyatta, who is also the son
of Jomo Kenyatta, the first neo-colonial ruler of Kenya, polled 1.7 million
votes (31percent) against over 3.5
million votes (64 percent) for the
NARC candidate, Mwai Kibaki.
NARC leadership is made of "former members of KANU." Mwai
Kibaki was a vice president under
Moi’s regime for ten years, before
defecting to the opposition. On
October 14, the Rainbow Alliance (a
faction in KANU, led by the party
Secretary General Raila Odinga,
Vice President Saitoti and Chairman
Kalonzo Musoka), after talks with
opposition political parties, resigned
from KANU and took over the Liberal
Democratic Party (LDP), an existing
minor party.
LDP then joined the opposition
alliance, the National Alliance (Party)
of Kenya (NAK), which is comprised
of about 13 political parties and two
pressure groups. The two formed a
strong opposition, a super alliance,
with a view to fielding one presidential candidate against President
Moi’s choice, Uhuru Kenyatta. This
super alliance came to be known as
of
some
K A N U ’s
leaders to
the opposition. Then
Moi’s decision
to
i m p o s e
U h u r u
Kenyatta as
his successor offered
an excuse
to some of
K A N U ’s
leaders to
the
join
opposition
in order to
extend or
Mwai Kibaki (right) won the Kenyan elections over Uhuru Kenyatta (left), son of neo-colonialist Jomo
rescue their
Kenyatta, and promises to continue to hand Kenya over to the imerialists.
political
careers.
ences. Imperialist media have used
Kibaki’s new government pledges
this December election as a conloyalty to the white imperialist ruler’s
crete example of democracy in
programs of domination of Kenya.
Kenya.
Kibaki is no different from Moi.
The African People’s Socialist
They both represent the same genoParty (APSP) believes that selfcidal program that keeps Kenya
determination is the highest form of
under the grip of white imperialism,
democracy. This implies that Kenya
through the IMF, World Bank, multibe free from direct and indirect white
national corporations and other ecoimperialist control. A struggle for
nomic parasitic institutions that loot
democracy is a struggle for the rise
our land.
to power by the African working
In fact, Raila Odinga, a leading
class in alliance with the peasantry.
member of NARC and Kibaki’s govIt is a struggle where all African patriernment, stated clearly that the
ots achieve unity under the leaderNARC government would continue
ship of the African working class.
the privatization of State enterprises.
Today, the masses are disorgaKibaki himself said that his governnized, demoralized or locked in tribal
ment was interested in working with
politics that are used by all factions
the IMF and the World Bank. He
of the petty bourgeoisie to obtain
appealed to the two imperialist instivotes purely based on ethnic affiliatutions to resume aid to Kenya.
tion.
The socio-economic conditions of
The struggle for democracy is the
the people will continue to worsen.
struggle to rebuild the independent
Arap Moi, the outgoing
pupils drop out in standard seven
anti-colonial movement and comtyrant, said in August 2000
because they cannot pay school
plete our Mau Mau revolutionary
that "the conditions
fees.
struggle from the `60s. It is a struggle
imposed by the IMF and
to take power away from the African
Struggle
for
democracy
is
a
World Bank for their new
petty bourgeoisie and put it in the
struggle of the African working
aid programme to Kenya
hands of the African working class. It
are too harsh." Kibaki’s
class revolutionary party to take
is a struggle to transform Kenya into
regime can only mean
power away from the traitorous
a conscious front of the international
more hell for the masses of
African petty bourgeoisie
African revolution. It is a struggle to
Africans in Kenya.
end indirect white rule in Kenya.
We do not want to hear excuses
According to the same
We are calling on all Kenyan revfrom anyone. The petty bourgeoisie
Kenyan government statisolutionaries and patriots to join the
knows what they are doing. NARC
tics, published in 2000, an
building of the African Socialist
and KANU are two sides of the same
estimated 13.4 million
International, the party of the African
coin. They represent the African
Kenyans, just over half of
working class that will fight in Kenya
petty bourgeois class, whose existhe population, lived below
for land reform that will give the land
tence depends on their ability to
the total poverty line in
to the peasants and put the workers
secure foreign imperialist interests in
1997. This means that half
in power.
Africa.
Former Kenyan neo-colonialist president Arap
of the population is unable
Elections are held to decide what
Inthaka and Wiyathi!
Moi pictured with George Bush
to consume as required.
faction will control the neo-colonial
In relation to health,
(Land and Freedom!)
State machine, which is used to proannual spending per capita
tect and cover up all the economic
A Mau Mau slogan, in the
declined from U.S. $9.82 in 1980/81
the National Alliance Rainbow
and political crimes committed
Kikuyu language, used during
to about U.S. $6.2 in 1996. The ratio
Coalition.
against African revolutionaries, patriof doctors to patients dropped from
It is clear that NARC was created
the 1950s and `60s in the
ots and the masses of impoverished
one for every 5,600 people in 1994 to
to secure the future of one sector of
struggle
against British imperiAfricans.
one for every 6,800 people in 1996.
the African petty bourgeoisie, who
alism in Kenya.
KANU, under Moi and Kenyatta
Today the State cannot provide 50
could no longer see a future inside
before him, used political violence in
percent of the total recurrent health
KANU or under KANU’s rule. A
the form of assassinations and the
expenditure. Forty percent of the
series of U.S. and European-sponimprisonment of its opponents as a
rural population has no access to
sored polls predicting victory for the
primary form of settling their differhealth services. Fifty percent of the
opposition fuelled the defection of
NARC and KANU
are two sides of
the same coin.
They represent the
African petty
bourgeois class,
whose existence
depends on their
ability to secure
foreign imperialist
interests in Africa.
12
THE BURNING SPEAR
May 2003
AFRICA
British and U.S. Imperialist Hands off Zimbabwe:
Zimbabwe for the African People!
LONDON, England — Today, the
African masses of Zimbabwe are
fighting for the return of their land
after more than 100 years of white
colonial rule and 20 years of poverty,
hunger and landlessness since the
so-called independence from white
domination.
Today, Zimbabwe is supposed to
be an independent, black state.
However, the white settlers control
70 percent of the land even though
they make up less than 1 percent of
the population. While African workers
and peasants starve and suffer from
unemployment on their own land,
most of the land stolen by the white
invaders is used to grow crops to be
exported to Europe, such as tobacco
or flowers, or the land remains fallow
and unused.
All land must return to the poor
masses of African workers and
peasants, not to Mugabe's ZanuPF corrupt leaders
The African masses of Zimbabwe
will no longer stand for this. While
they have begun to take back their
land, Britain, the former colonial
power and slave master who ruled
over the African masses in
Zimbabwe, has slandered the African
people as terrorists and murderers.
Britain is doing everything it can to
prevent the return of the land of
Zimbabwe to the hands of its rightful
African owners. We must defend the
African people of Zimbabwe and
defend their right to take back their
land.
The victory of the people's
independence war was
incomplete and hijacked by the
petty bourgeois class led by
Zanu-PF
During the 1960s and 1970s, the
African masses of Zimbabwe fought
a heroic struggle to end white domination over their lives and land. They
took up arms to do this because the
Manifesto
out the world — take the form of the
African primitive petty bourgeoisie.
This tiny social class holds Africa in
captivity in the service of imperialism
and serves as a cover for continued
white rule and domination. This class
sees the fate of Africa and African
people as forever under the subjugation of white power. It has secured its
own position of prestige and prosperity as collaborators with imperialism,
which continues to control Africa's
resources and loot Africa's wealth.
The African primitive petty bourgeoisie, therefore, has no interest in
Africa's liberation and unification or
the emancipation of the hundreds of
millions of African workers and peasants from famine and back-breaking
toil.
The mighty awakening of African
workers and poor peasants has
unleashed convulsions throughout
British colonialist and white settlers
assassinated and massacred African
people who demanded freedom.
In 1980, when the total victory of
the African masses was approaching, Britain, the USA, black neo-colonial governments in Africa, and the
current Zimbabwean President
Robert Mugabe, signed a deal that
allowed the white settlers to keep the
land while a black government in the
form of the Zimbabwe African
National Union (ZANU) took office.
Land reform was supposed to be
implemented to put land in the hands
of the African masses. Britain was
supposed to compensate the white
settlers for their land. This never happened!
The land repossession may
secure victory for Mugabe's regime
in the near future but will not end the
imperialist economic crisis that continues to strangle the African
masses.
The Zimbabwean dollar has
plunged. Taxes were raised to pay
the war veterans pension fund, which
created a massive rebellion of poor
people against the government in
December ‘97, and set the war veterans against Mugabe's regime.
The government has sent
Zimbabwean troops into the Congo
to protect the mining investments of
Mugabe and his generals. Those
troops cost $7 million every week. In
addition, the fact that the mutilated
and dead bodies of soldiers are coming home to Zimbabwe from the war
in Congo is very unpopular with the
masses of Zimbabwe.
There is 50 percent unemployment. Seventy percent of the African
people live in poverty every day.
The life expectancy at birth for the
total population is 39 years. The
infant mortality rate is 61 deaths per
1,000 live births.
With the forthcoming election, the
land repossession from white settlers
has turned the anger of the war vet-
This organization, financed by the
white settlers within Zimbabwe, also
enjoys the support of the British ruling class. In the absence of a
dynamic revolutionary organization
to organize the impoverished
Africans masses, the Movement for
Democratic Change (MDC) led by
Morgan Tsvangirai, has been able to
obscure the real land issue and draw
support from poor people in urban
areas. It uses sell-out slogans such
as "jobs not the land."
However, we must ensure that the
MDC does not get any support from
African people anywhere in the
world.
Revolutionary unity of Africa led
by the African Socialist International
is the only way forward. The events
in Zimbabwe reveal the need for an
international revolutionary party of
African workers aligned with the poor
peasants. This party will fight for the
only solution to economic and social
the Continent through the toppling of
Mobutu, the retreat of French imperialism, the upheaval and rebellions
throughout Zimbabwe, Nigeria, the
Central African Republic, Ivory
Coast, Kenya as well as in St.
Petersburg, Florida. The rising up of
African workers has Africa's neocolonial traitors and collaborators
trembling in their boots. It is the
workers and poor peasants who will
overthrow the oppressive power the
African petty bourgeoisie holds over
Africa in partnership with imperialism.
This awakening will constitute an
African Revolution that will consolidate our national consciousness, culture and identity through mass struggle on an international scale. It will
constitute the final offensive against
imperialism and white power which
will have nowhere left to run as the
oppressed hundreds of millions of
African workers and poor peasants
consciously pursue our historic mission of the total unification of the
African Continent and African people
throughout the world.
Never again will we allow our people to be slaves or to be divided by
languages, ethnic grouping, false
borders or false micro-nationalities.
This awakening African people
stand at the vanguard of the struggle
of the world's oppressed people to
build a new world in which the currently endured humiliation, famine,
terror and disease becomes a distant, faded memory. We believe that
it is only fitting that the people who
gave birth to world civilization, and
who are the primary victims of the
barbarism that has established hegemony throughout the world, take
responsibility for leading the struggle
for liberation of the majority of the
planet from the tyranny and despotism of U.S.- led world imperialism.
Brothers and Sisters! "The hour of
Africa's redemption," which the great
Marcus Garvey so prophetically envisioned many years ago, is upon us!
We must build the African Socialist
The war veterans have been taking back the land occupied by colonial white
settlers since 2000 for redistribution.
erans away from Mugabe and onto
the white farmers and British imperialists.
The Movement for Democratic
Change is another neocolonialist alternative
What you can do!
Join the African Socialist
International Planning
Committee, Every Friday at
7pm
4-16, Deptford Bridge, SE8
4HH.
Buses:47,53,453 and 177, DLR
Deptford Bridge.
Contact the African People's
Socialist Party at: Tel:020
82651731 or e-mail: [email protected]
crises that exist there and in all of
Africa — the revolutionary unification
of Africa under the leadership of
African workers and poor peasants.
Land to the Zimbabwean
peasants
Power to the Zimbabwean
workers
Africans of the world unite in
defense of the people of
Zimbabwe
International (ASI) and unite our dispersed, oppressed and one-billionstrong African nation under the slogan "Touch One! Touch All!" We must
build the ASI under the leadership of
the African workers aligned with the
poor peasantry, for it is they who are
the creators of social wealth and
value. It is they who are the only
social force capable of waging our
liberation struggle to its victorious
conclusion, African workers and
peasants must assume the leadership of our society as a condition for
our freedom!
Subscribe!
May 2003
THE BURNING SPEAR
13
AFRICA
Nigerian elections serve imperialist interests:
Neo-colonial rule continues
BY NZELA KINSHASA
The bourgeois election in Nigeria,
as with elections elsewhere in the
African world, can't solve the crisis
caused by the imperialist grip on our
resources and the imposition of a
colonial economy that only benefits
Europe and North America.
Most of the African masses live on
less than $2 dollars a day. "Two
thirds of the population are living
below the poverty line, even though
Nigeria is Africa's second largest
economy and has reaped more than
$280 billion from oil in the past 30
years."
Despite being the fifth highest oil
producing country in the world,
Nigeria continues to experience a
fuel shortage. This forces Nigeria’s
neo-colonial leaders to import refined
oil.
As elsewhere in Africa, they failed
to maintain the basic transport infrastructures throughout the country.
Railways and roads are now in a
near state of collapse. The economy
is strained by regular power cuts and
the country is held hostage by the
illegitimate debt of $30 billion from
does not have a program of industrialization that will make it a self-sufficient industrial nation. Shell Oil
Company controls 52 percent of oil
production in Nigeria. The U.S.
imported 339,082 million barrels of
oil in 2001.
The national economy is largely
dependent on oil revenues. They
account for 92 percent of foreign
exchange. The Nigerian petty bourgeoisie is well known for its disregard
of lives of our people. There are
many known billionaires in Nigeria
who stole the people's wealth.
March elections between two
ex-generals characterized by
fraud and violence
The bourgeois press reported
wide spread malpractices of vote rigging and ballot box stuffing. Armed
militias and the army raided polling
stations to seize ballot boxes. The
two main big parties bought votes,
bribed election officials and intimidated the voters. Regular soldiers
and armed gangs turned voters away
from the polls.
Imperialist observers stated that
there were massive irregularities in at least 13 states.
This in itself gives us a
basis to speculate that
these elections did not
enjoy the free and willing
participation of African people. In April, The Economist
magazine, the mouthpiece
of the British imperialists,
wrote, "The elections were
dirty and sporadically violent. Big bundles of cash
were handed out during
party primaries, and smaller
ones were handed out in
the street during the campaign. In parts of the southeast, most voters were too
frightened to vote, because
of battles between rival militias, but the ruling party
nonetheless won huge
majorities in supposed turn
outs of over 90 percent."
These March elections
have strengthened the
Riot police took over the site of a protest
power of Obansanjo's
against the swearing in of President Obasanjo.
Peoples Democratic Party.
General Obansanjo, was
the International Monetary Fund
re-elected with 61.94 percent of the
(IMF) and the World Bank gangs.
vote. That is 24,456,140 votes.
In 2000, Nigeria paid more than
General Muhammadu Buhari, the
$3.1 billion or 14 and a half percent
leader of the All Nigeria People's
of its export earnings to the white
Party (ANPP) with 32.19 percent or
imperialist parasitic institutions. This
12,710,02 votes. Out of 36 states
parasitic relationship opportunistithat exist in Nigeria, the PDP
cally prompts Obansanjo, Nigerian
increases its number of governors
president and leader of the Peoples
from 21 to 27. Its majority in the senDemocratic Party (PDP) to say,
ate and in the House of
"Original borrowing from the Paris
Representatives has gone up to 72
Club was about $13 billion. So far,
seats and 198 respectively. The
about $17 billion has been repaid.
ANPP has 28 seats and 83 seats
Yet, we are assumed to still owe
respectively. The smaller political
about $22 billion."
organizations won the rest of the
The crisis in Nigeria comes from
seats.
the reality that the imperialist counThere are speculations that, with
tries and institutions like Shell exploit
the strength of his second victory,
our labor and resources. Nigeria
Obasanjo will now engage in an
Vice President Atiku Ababakar, left, and President Olusegun Obasanjo, right,
during the inauguration
It is the
imperialist
imposition of the
Nigerian colonial
economy and its
support of the
black puppets and
thieves that have
brought hell fire on
the impoverished
African masses in
Nigeria.
aggressive program of privatization
and reforms designed to implement
in full the IMF and World Bank programs. We must take this as an
urgent call to the African workers to
organize independently of the sellout and murderous petty bourgeoisie
and fight for political power in the
hands of workers.
The way forward is to build the
African Socialist International (ASI).
The ASI will fight to put the electoral
process and political power in the
hands of Nigerian workers.
We must make immense efforts to
reach out to the African workers who
are courageously organizing strikes
in delta regions, despite the military
assault they have suffered. We must
reach out to the African workers in
Lagos and Ibadan who demonstrated against the IMF/World Bank
genocidal programs. The ASI is an
effort that calls on the masses of
workers to resist and defeat all imperialist programs of extraction of our
labor and wealth.
We have to initiate a worldwide
campaign to expose and defeat the
electoral process that is designed to
perpetuate imperialist rule in black
faces. We must struggle to take control of polling stations and fill out our
own workers candidates with our
own political program aimed at taking power from the African petty
bourgeoisie bureaucrat-comprador
social class.
We must raise criticisms of the
wrong policies and ideologies inside
the African labor movement in
Nigeria, as represented by the leadership of the Nigerian Labor Council
that supported Obasanjo in the
recent elections. They know all too
well that Obansanjo and the PDP
represent white imperialism in
Nigeria.
It is the imperialist imposition of
the Nigerian colonial economy and
its support of the black puppets and
thieves that have brought hell fire on
the impoverished African masses in
Nigeria.
An immense effort also must be
made to expose and defeat the ideology of obscurantism amongst the
masses. The minds of the masses
have been locked up in the name of
Islam, Christianity or African spiritualism.
We must wage a relentless struggle for an African identity and consciousness amongst the workers and
peasants. We must isolate the ethnic
chauvinism and hatred propagated
by the petty bourgeoisie in order to
secure their power bases in an
opportunistic search for power and
material benefit at the expense of
African Independence.
Only a revolutionary party, armed
with the African Internationalism philosophy, will resolve the division
between North and South, Christian
and Muslim. This is the only way to
end the unequal distribution of
wealth that leaves the delta regions
the poorest in the country, when they
produce 40 to 50 percent of the
country’s oil.
Polling stations, banks, oil refineries and army barracks must be in the
hands of African workers! The IMF,
World Bank, Chevron and Shell owe
reparations to African people now!
Power to the African Workers!
14
THE BURNING SPEAR
Central Committee
of the
April 2003
Point of the spear
African People’s
Socialist Party
The History and Role of the Proletariat
Party of the Black Working Class
Omali Yeshitela
Chairman
Gaida Kambon
National Secretary
Ironiff Ifoma
Director of Economic
Development
Bakari Olatunji
West Coast U.S. Regional
Representative
Reprinted from June 1985 issue of The
Burning Spear
Political parties have not always
existed in human society. Indeed,
they represent a rather new, one
might say modern, feature of human
society. They emerged with the
development of capitalism in Europe
where there was a growing bourgeois defined assumption of democracy that was rooted in the ascendancy of the bourgeoisie to power.
The existence of political parties
is recognition of class contradictions
in society and the role of the political
organization of the people as means
of acquiring and keeping political
power.
For African people, both on the
Continent and elsewhere, political
parties are even more recent. This
is because the European bourgeoisie came to power in Europe off
the slave trade in Africa. Even as it
was promoting democracy for itself
in Europe, it used every available
resource to immobilize and disorganize the African. Hence, class contradictions within Africa never
reached the level and sharpness of
Europe except as an extension of the
power of the emerging European
bourgeoisie in the form of African
slave-catchers, etc.
For Africans then, the external
enemy became such a dominant
force, that it served to unite the
broadest sectors of our community
as one oppressed community while
muting or making secondary the contradictions within our community.
Within the U.S. this state of affairs
was generally summed up as the
white people against the black people. When, by some chance, there
was a white individual who acted differently, who did something that
apparently supported the demands
of black people, or when there was
an African who betrayed the
demands of black people, or our
movement, our people, would generally sum this up as due to the personal qualities of individuals
involved. This was a "good" white
man or a "bad" or "Uncle Tom" black
man.
The features of class began to
achieve definition as early as the first
quarter of this century. (The GarveyDubois controversy and the communist articulations of the African Blood
Brotherhood are examples.) But it
was only in the sixties that the actual
objective conditions emerged
sharply enough for the class contradictions to become consolidated
within our oppressed colonized community, and to achieve a solid foundation upon a material base.
This is because the movement of
the sixties had, as an immediate
influence, the concrete, material
developments of the fifties. It was
during the fifties that the alliance
between our movement and the liberal bourgeoisie consolidated itself in
mass struggle and achieved a revolutionary character. It activated the
African victims of U.S. colonialism as
conscious participants, impacted on
the consciousness and practical life
of all the peoples within the U.S.,
overthrew the immediate form of
capitalist rule of a sector of the white
ruling class in the South, and
achieved legal democratic rights for
African people.
This struggle came to sharp,
definitive political life in the South in
the fifties because of the convergence of two important factors —
one subjective and the other objective.
The subjective factor was the
longing by colonially oppressed
Africans for freedom from foreign
rule, for dignity, and for a better life
without brutality and material want.
The objective factor was the tremendous growth in the production capac-
Join the
African People’s
Socialist Party
Watu Mwariama
Northeast U.S. Regional
Representative
Nzela Kinshasa
Director of
International Affairs
Contact:
1245 18th Avenue South
St. Petersburg Florida,
33705
727-821-6620
[email protected]
The liberal
philosophy of nonviolence, a
philosophy
necessary for the
support of the
liberal white ruling
class, met its fate
in the same flames
of black rebellion
that consumed city
after city as the
first, full-fledged
generation of the
black proletariat
came to political
life as colonized
workers becoming
conscious, if barely
so, of its separate
class interest.
ity that followed the second imperialist war to re-divide the world between
capitalist powers. The war resulted in
the U.S. becoming the world's greatest power and the possessor —
either directly or indirectly — of the
colonial raw materials which were
previously held exclusively by
European powers.
This growth in production capacity multiplied the need for industrial
workers almost overnight. These
workers could only be found in the
see Spear, page 16
April 2003
THE BURNING SPEAR
15
The Working Platform of the African People's Socialist Party
WHAT WE WANT—WHAT WE BELIEVE
Adopted September 23, 1979. Revised and adopted at the First Congress of the African People's Socialist Party, September 6, 1981.
1
We want peace, dignity, and the right to build a prosperous life through
our own labor and in our own interests.
We believe that the U.S. North American government and society were founded on the
genocide of Native people, the theft of their land, and the forcible dispersal, enslavement,
and colonization of millions of African people. We believe that the present condition of
existence for African people within current U.S. borders is colonialism, a condition of existence where a whole people is oppressively dominated by a foreign and alien state power
for the purpose of economic exploitation and political advantage. We believe further that
this colonial domination is the primary basis of the problems of African people within the
U.S. and that we shall know neither peace, prosperity, nor human dignity until this colonialist domination is overthrown and the power over our lives rests in our own hands.
2
We want the rights to economic development and creative and productive employment which promote the needs and well-being of our
entire people.
We believe that colonialism is a blood-sucking system which causes all economic development
to benefit the colonialist ruling class state and society at the expense of our colonized people. We
also believe that the massive, habitual unemployment and underemployment of our people benefit the U.S. colonialist ruling class and capitalist system and that a struggle by African people
for jobs must be combined with a struggle for socialism and independent economic development.
3
We want an end to all local, state, federal, and other taxation of black
people by the U.S. government and any of its agencies.
We believe that such taxation is illegitimate, that black people have no real or meaningful
authority within the U.S. government, and that U.S. taxation of African people is therefore
taxation without representation. We believe that in the absence of such real or meaningful
authority we have nothing to say about how such monies are used, and that therefore the
taxes taken from black people are often used against us and other oppressed and exploited
peoples within the U.S. and around the world.
We believe that the use of taxes extracted from the African population to build more prisons to stuff us in and to hire more police to kill us with is criminal, as is the use of these
taxes to hire soldiers to intimidate and plunder peoples oppressed by this same system
internationally. We also believe African people must refuse to pay taxes to a government
which uses such taxes to prop up and support brutal dictators around the world who keep
their own peoples oppressed and living in squalor in order to maintain U.S. and Western
imperialist economic and political domination.
4
We want the right to free speech and political association, a guarantee of
the right to work for the betterment and emancipation of black people
without fear of political imprisonment and the loss of life, limb, and livelihood.
We believe that the liberation of African people throughout the world will come primarily as
a result of our own efforts. We believe it is our duty to our mothers and fathers, our children
and ourselves, to organize ourselves to overcome our oppression. We believe that the rights to
organize and speak out against our oppression are basic human rights and that the U.S. government must discontinue its attempts to smash these rights and must discontinue criminal
attacks on those African patriots who work for the betterment and emancipation of our people.
5
We want the right to international political and economic association
with Africans and all other peoples anywhere on the face of the Earth.
We believe that all black people are African people and are a part of a single national entity.
We believe that the genuine freedom of African people everywhere is irreversibly linked to
the creation of an independent, united, and socialist Africa. We believe the struggle of African
people within the U.S. represents the U.S. front of the worldwide movement of African people for African liberation, political independence, and socialist democracy. We believe that
the worldwide struggle for African liberation is in unity with the struggles being waged by
the majority of the peoples of the world to end the oppression of nations by nations and to
create a new world, within which the toiling masses will end the system of workers and bosses and slaves and masters and will own and benefit from the means and products of our labor
and will have political authority over our own lives. We believe that the natural, objective
friends of our struggle for African liberation, independence, and socialist democracy are all
the toiling masses of the world — the people of the Middle East, the Asian and Latin
American peasants and workers, the democratic forces throughout Eastern and Western
Europe and the U.S., and the truly socialist states of the world, and that we must therefore
have the absolute right to free political and economic international association.
6
We want the immediate and unconditional release of all black people
who are presently locked down in U.S. prisons.
We believe that all the African men and women who are locked down in the U.S. concentration camps commonly known as prisons are there due to decisions, laws, and circumstances which were created by aliens and foreigners for their own benefit and as a means
of genocidal colonialist control. We believe that these decisions, laws, and circumstances
were created and are enforced without our consent and are therefore illegitimate. We
believe that the African men and women who are locked down in these concentration
camps are victims of U.S. colonialist ruling class justice which maintains our enslavement
and terrorizes our people, and that they should therefore be released immediately to the just
representatives of our struggle for liberation, independence, and socialist democracy.
7
We want complete amnesty for all African political prisoners and prisoners of war from U.S. prisons or their immediate release to any friendly country which will accept them and give them political asylum.
We believe that U.S. prisons are also used as the illegitimate tool for torturing, murdering,
and holding captive those courageous daughters and sons of Africa who through their patriotic deeds or spoken or written words in support of the cause of our liberation have become
political prisoners and prisoners of war. We believe, along with the majority of the peoples
of the world, that it is the duty of the colonized and enslaved to resist slavery and colonialism and to fight for socialism and those who do so are patriots and heroines and heroes
and should be held in the highest esteem.
8
We want the immediate withdrawal of the U.S. police from our
oppressed and exploited communities.
We believe that the various U.S. police agencies which occupy our communities are arms of
the U.S. colonialist state which is responsible for keeping our people enslaved and terrorized.
We believe that the U.S. police agencies do not serve us, but instead represent the first line of
U.S. defense against the just struggle of our people for peace, dignity, and socialist democracy. Therefore, we believe the U.S. police is an illegitimate standing army, a colonial army in
the African community and must withdraw immediately from our community, to be replaced
by our liberation forces whose struggles in defense of our community and against our oppression demonstrate their loyalty to our community and their willingness to serve in its interest.
9
We want an end to the political and social oppression and economic
exploitation of African women.
We believe in the absolute, unequivocal, political, social, and economic equality of African
women and men. We believe that a fundamental test of the progressive or revolutionary
character of any organization, party, movement, or society is its commitment, confirmed in
practice, to the destruction of the special oppression of women and the elevation of women
to the rightful place as equal partners and leaders in the forward motion of the development
of human society and as leaders, makers, and shapers of human history.
10
We want the right to build an African People's Liberation Army.
We believe that true freedom, although often taken away, cannot be given to a people. We
believe that African people are our own liberators, and that we have a right and obligation to
build an African People’s Liberation Army to defend our political gains, our freedom fighters and communities, and to win our actual freedom from our oppressive colonial slave masters. We believe that neither meaningful freedom, nor guaranteed political and social gains,
nor genuine liberation are possible without the assuring existence of an African People’s
Liberation Army. We believe further that the only legitimate wars are wars of national liberation, and wars to oppose imperialist aggression, and that therefore, the only legitimate military forces for black people to serve with are military forces which defend liberty and repel
imperialist aggression. Such a force would be the African People’s Liberation Army.
11
We want the U.S. and the international European ruling class and
states to pay Africa and African people for the centuries of genocide, oppression, and enslavement of our people.
We believe that U.S. and European civilization were born from, and are presently maintained by, the horrendous theft of human and material resources from Africa and its people. We also believe that this theft of human and material resources is responsible for the
present underpopulation and underdevelopment of Africa and her people and the political
servitude, material impoverishment, and cultural discontinuity and disintegration of
African people throughout the world. We believe that Africa and African people are due
reparations, just economic compensation, billions of dollars which must be paid to the
Organization of African Unity or any other legitimate international organization of African
people, for equitable distribution for the development of Africa. We also believe that reparations must be distributed to the various independent African states dispersed throughout
the world, and to the legitimate representatives of African people forcibly dispersed
throughout the world who have not yet won liberation.
12
We want an end to the vicious, self-serving U.S. and Western
European political, economic, and military interference in the
affairs of Africa and African people throughout the world.
We believe that African people in Africa and elsewhere have a right and responsibility to
solve our own problems, free from the unwanted, and self-serving interference of U.S. and
Western imperialists. We believe that the U.S. and Western imperialist interference in the
affairs of our people is designed to maintain the continuation of the theft of our human and
material resources and our oppression and impoverishment.
We believe that African people must be free to organize and struggle for an end to colonialism
and neo-colonialism without interference from U.S. and Western imperialism which supports
neo-colonialism and colonialism in Africa, the U.S. and elsewhere, and which has deposed progressive and revolutionary African leaders and replaced them with neo-colonialist stooges.
13
We want an end to U.S. colonial domination of African people
within the U.S.
14
We want the total liberation and unification of Africa under an AllAfrican socialist government.
We believe that the primary struggle of African people within the U.S. during this period is
to throw off the alien U.S. colonial domination which is responsible for virtually every hardship imposed on black people by this government that is identifiable as a “black problem.”
We believe that our problems with education — from our inability to control our own
schools and determine the education of our own children, to the inferior and racist quality
of the education we do receive — are caused by colonialism. We believe that our problems
with health care — from the absence of black controlled and operated health clinics and
institutions throughout our communities to the hazardous health conditions imposed on us
by poverty and callous government decisions — are caused by colonialism.
We believe that our problems with housing — from the unavailability of decent and adequate housing for the majority of our people, to the dilapidated and vermin-infested housing we are forced to live in — are caused by colonialism.
We believe that our problems with food and clothing — from the terrible quality and
quantity which are imposed on us by blood-sucking merchants, to our inability to produce
and distribute them for and among ourselves — are caused by colonialism, where our
whole people is dominated and oppressed by a foreign and alien state power for the purpose of economic exploitation and political advantage.
We believe that “the total liberation and unification of Africa under an All-African socialist government must be the primary objective of all Black revolutionaries throughout the
world. It is an objective which, when achieved, will bring about the fulfillment of the aspirations of Africans and people of African descent everywhere. It will at the same time
advance the triumph of the international socialist revolution, and the onward progress
toward communism, under which every society is ordered on the principle of — from each
according to his (her) ability, to each according to his (her) needs.” — Kwame Nkrumah
INDEPENDENCE IN OUR LIFETIME!
see NPDUM, page
16
THE BURNING SPEAR
Spear
South among the African toilers who
were trapped in an economic form of
the capitalist system which was labor
intensive and required the most
oppressive and backward political
methods for its maintenance.
It was the struggle to acquire
these workers, absolutely necessary
for capitalist expansion and imperialist economic development, that led
one sector of the white ruling class to
support and encourage the black
movement of the South against the
particular form of capitalist rule then
prevailing in the South. And because
it was a struggle against a particular
form of capitalist rule and not capitalism itself; because of the strategic
location of the black petty bourgeoisie which was also only interested in partial revolution, the
alliance between our movement and
the liberal white ruling class consolidated the leadership of the black
petty bourgeoisie over our movement.
But the outcome of this alliance
was something that neither the liberal bourgeoisie nor the black petty
bourgeoisie could clearly anticipatenamely the emergence of an African
proletariat right in the bowels of
America itself. This proletariat rapidly
became conscious of aims which
were not only in contradiction with
the aims of colonial white power, but
were increasingly being revealed as
in contradiction with the aims of the
colonized liberal black petty bourgeoisie. And as these contradictions
in aims began to crystallize, so too
did contradictions in ideology and
tactics begin to crystallize.
The generally, though inconsistently materialist philosophy of "black
nationalism" began to challenge the
idealist and obscurantist philosophy
of the liberal black petty bourgeoisie.
The "dream" of a better day in
America as a consequence of the
moral regeneration of whites of the
oppressor nation was challenged by
the nightmare of the U.S. objective
reality and the demand for Black
Power to determine our own black
destiny. The liberal philosophy of
non-violence, a philosophy necessary for the support of the liberal
white ruling class, met its fate in the
same flames of black rebellion that
consumed city after city as the first,
full-fledged generation of the black
proletariat came to political life as
colonized workers becoming conscious, if barely so, of its separate
class interest.
It is during and subsequent to this
period that we begin to see the emergence of revolutionary black parties.
It is during and subsequent to this
period that we begin to understand
the nature of political parties — not
as simple associations of people who
have the same general beliefs, but
as repositories of particular class
interests, as class parties, as the
political instruments of particular
classes, as the projectors and protectors of the will and interests of
particular classes, as the concentration and concretization in political
form of the economic interests of
particular classes.
African Proletariat Born
Political parties are organizations
of the most advanced representatives of a particular class. The tasks
of political parties are directly tied to
the material interests of the classes
they represent.
Sometimes elements of a particular class are not aware of their own
Fundamental Class Interests
an understanding of their material
interests; in keeping the oppressed
and exploited peoples ignorant of
science and a scientific approach to
an examination of contradictions of
class exploitation and national
oppression. Ideologically it gives rise
to an interest in Ideological
Imperialism, the imperialist domina-
The African working class in the U.S. emerged as leadership working in its
own interests during the Black Power Movement of the ‘60s.
class interests. Sometimes elements
of the capitalist-colonialist white ruling class, for example, are drunks or
drug addicts, or even insane as is a
member of the Kennedy family and
as was the notorious Howard
Hughes. Sometimes elements of the
ruling class are wife beaters, bedwetters, or lazy ignoramuses who
are unconcerned and disdainful of
the interests of the capitalist-colonialist ruling class.
However, it is the advanced elements and representatives of the
capitalist-colonialist ruling class,
organized in political parties, which
look out for the political interests of
the capitalist-colonialist ruling class,
organized in political parties, which
look out for the interests of the entire
class — this includes the interests of
the drunks, wife-beaters, etc. It is this
fact which makes them the
"advanced" elements, the activist
elements.
What then are the interests of the
U.S. capitalist-colonialist class? The
most fundamental interest of the capitalist-colonialist ruling class is the
perpetuation of the capitalist system
and itself as the ruling class. This
fundamental interest gives rise to
other interests:
Economically it gives rise to the
interest in the elimination of all economic competition, both domestically
and internationally; the interest of
dominating the natural resources
and markets of the entire world.
Politically it gives rise to an interest in restricting the political liberties
of the peoples of the entire world, an
interest in crushing any political liberties which do not facilitate the economic domination of the U.S. capitalists, and which might lead to the
development of an independent political expression which would challenge the hegemony of U.S. capitalism.
Ideologically it gives rise to an
interest in idealism and obscurantism; in keeping the oppressed and
exploited peoples, especially the
black working class, separated from
The Black Panther
Party provided the
closest thing to a
revolutionary
center that our
movement has ever
experienced and,
although incorrect
on some essentials,
introduced the
question of class
struggle to our
movement that
became briefly
generalized within
a large sector of
the black working
class itself.
tion of ideology that is consistent with
the economic domination of the capitalist social system.
During the sixties, when black
political parties began to emerge
among the colonized African people,
it was because the pressures of
class contradictions among the colonially oppressed peoples ourselves
began to crystallize and revealed a
colonial society that was much more
complex than before.
Before the achievement of legal
democratic rights it was all of "us"
(blacks) against "them" (whites). The
U.S. government itself was not generally recognized as an agent of a
particular class and social system
and our movement, under the leadership of the black petty bourgeoisie,
courted the various U.S. presidents
assiduously, hoping to find a "good"
one who was sympathetic to the gen-
May 2003
eral, democratic aims and demands
of the movement.
But with the achievement of legal
democratic rights by a movement
which was winning its own concessions in a decade of the most vicious
struggle, the basic aspirations of the
black petty bourgeoisie, (which was
growing due to the effectiveness of
the movement and the intervention of
the liberal white bourgeoisie) were
realized. However, this decade of
struggle had also thrust a new generation of fully mobilized black workers into the scene as the main social
factor in the U.S. North American
political life. The aspirations of the
workers were not realized by the
achievement of legal democratic
rights. The attempts to moderate the
Black Liberation Movement, to decelerate it and direct it toward liberal
bourgeois democratic sops, were
met with the cries of "Burn, Baby
Burn," in Los Angeles and "Black
Power" in Mississippi.
The crystallization of the different
aspirations embraced by different
social elements within our movement
gave fuel to a movement to build
independent political parties among
the colonially oppressed African population.
But although it was the pressure
of class contradictions within our
colonized society which gave birth
to the party-building movement, our
inexperience in this area frustrated
our efforts, and more often than not,
we were unable to build parties
which clearly identified the class
interests they served and the relationship the interests of this particular class had to overthrowing the
colonial oppression of our whole
people.
What did happen immediately
was the creation of certain party formations which were capable of raising various principles of unity which
went beyond the limitations of the
liberal black petty bourgeoisie in the
struggle against U.S. domestic colonial oppression of our whole people.
Those who could unite with the militant anti-colonial principles, which
clearly distinguished them from the
liberal black petty bourgeoisie,
associated themselves into the
same party and were able to characterize themselves as revolutionaries or ambiguously as black nationalists. Those sectors of the movement which were trapped within the
limitations of reform under U.S.
colonialism were characterized as
Uncle Toms and sometimes as the
black bourgeoisie.
In any event none of these parties
was capable of raising up the interests of the black working class as the
hegemonic interests of the party.
Although it was the pressure of the
black working class resistance and
struggle which was pushing this
party-building process forward, it
was essentially petty-bourgeois
nationalists — often revolutionary —
who were leading this effort. The
black working class was yet to seize
hegemony of its own revolutionary
movement, although history was
pushing events in that direction with
growing urgency.
The Black Panthers, First Black
Workers Party
The emergence of the Black
Panther Party in 1966-67 came clos-
May 2003
THE BURNING SPEAR
With the military defeat of the Black Revolution of the `60s, the U.S. government selected black petty bourgeois forces like Jesse Jackson to be the voice
for the African community at the expense of the interests of the African
working class.
est to being that party. It represented
the first time in the history of our
movement that a black political party
had identified itself as a socialist or
communist organization, with communist or socialist revolutionary
objectives.
Inherent in this declaration is the
assumption of a worldview with the
interests of the black working class
at its center. Certainly the vast bulk
of its membership was working class
and its 10 Point Program and
Platform raised what were the fundamentally working class demands.
But the Black Panther Party —
although it gave the colonially
oppressed black working class more
experience in leading its own struggle than any organization before it —
muddled its own effectiveness with
an ideology which mystified the character of the black working class
under colonialism by identifying
unemployed black workers who often
had lumpen proletariat tendencies as
the lumpen proletariat, thereby raising up conceptually a non working
class element as the leadership of
the Revolution.
Nevertheless, the Black Panther
Party provided the closest thing to a
revolutionary center that our movement has ever experienced and,
although incorrect on some essentials, introduced the question of class
struggle to our movement that
became briefly generalized within a
large sector of the black working
class itself.
Parties of the White Ruling
Class
The parties of the white ruling
class within the U.S. are the
Democratic and Republican parties.
The objective of the Democratic and
Republican parties is the perpetuation of the capitalist social system
which rests upon the foundation of
African oppression. Although both of
them are capable of prattle about
democracy, the democracy they talk
about is only a description of the
form assumed by organs of coercion
(police, army, courts, etc.), the State,
in exercising capitalist rule.
Neither the Democratic or
Republican Party is capable of talking about over throwing the capitalist
social system itself — whether its
form is democratic, openly dictatorial, or monarchist, thus allowing for
genuine socialist democracy with
ownership and authority in the hands
of the working class majority.
Moreover, for all their prattle about
democracy, neither party will ever be
able to bring about the democratic
self-determination of the broad mass
of African people, precisely because
the capitalist social system within the
nation state boundaries of the U.S.,
perhaps more than any place else,
rests upon the foundation of African
oppression going back to the days of
what is called slavery.
However, the Democratic and
Republican parties have been excellent tools of the white ruling class
precisely because they have
appeared to give the exploited workers and oppressed peoples a choice,
precisely because they have
appeared to provide the exploited
workers and oppressed peoples
alternatives and freedom of democratic participation in the political life
of the U.S. nation-State.
The Republican and Democratic
parties have been excellent political
tools of the white ruling class precisely because they have allowed the
white ruling class to monopolize
political, economic and ideological
power over the mass of workers and
oppressed peoples while obscuring
the class interests which are served
by the Republican and Democratic
parties. Hence, the exploited workers
and oppressed peoples — who, like
sectors of the bourgeoise, are often
ignorant of their class interests- are
usually found attempting to pursue
their interests within the parties of
the capitalist-colonialist ruling class.
Within the U.S. and most capitalist countries there are generally, but
not always, more than one capitalist
party. Within the U.S., this allows
the bourgeoise to wear two hats and
to assume the "good cop," "bad cop"
routine. In this way, the bourgeois
social system protects itself by passing political power to one bourgeois
party when the other has come into
disrepute with the people.
The fact that the people can vote
one or the other bourgeois party in
and out of power (bourgeois democracy) gives the impression of political
free will by the masses and acts as a
social pressure release valve, blunting the development of class struggle.
Actually the people have not exercised free will, which presupposes
information and science. Freedom is
the recognition of necessity, which is
prerequiste to exercising free will.
Within the U.S. and other places
where more than one capitalist party
dominates the political life of the people, elections are means of non-violent struggle by different sectors of
the ruling class for control of the
State.
Therefore, as opposed to different
social forces organized into their own
independent class organizations and
engaged in conscious class struggle,
one against the other, the two-party
system (within the U.S.) mobilizes
the various class and national forces
into the sevice of one sector of the
capitalist-colonialist ruling class
engaged in intra-class struggle with
another. The two-party system
obscures the class interests of the
exploited workers and oppressed
peoples and reduces the peoples
into reserve forces of one sector of
the bourgeoisie or another.
The white women's
and homosexual
movements have
become virtual scabs
on the Black
Revolution, offering
themselves up for
part of the booty of
parasitic capitalism,
demanding and
receiving favors and
privileges as their
price for class peace
under capitalism.
The question of class struggle
within the U.S. has always been difficult enough even without the twoparty duplicity of the bourgeoisie.
This has to do with the parasitic
nature of the capitalist system.
Within the U.S., this parasitism
stems from a social system built on
stolen land, the massacre of hundreds of thousands of Native people
and the enslavement of African people.
Hence, all social forces or classes
which have benefited from the development of the "New World," which
have found general happiness and
freedom from political oppression
and material want, have done so at
the expense of the life, liberty and
development of Native and African
peoples.
Hence, a material, economic,
basis for the politcal unity existing
between the U.S. North American
bourgeoisie and the U.S. North
American (white) working class. It is
a political unity directed against the
African and Native peoples, in
defense of the capitalist social system.
Hence,the parasitic nature of the
capitalist system.
The parasitic nature of the capitalist system is the basis for the political
and ideological leadership of the
modern U.S.-based African proletariat. It is the only social force
which has the exact combination of
qualities which makes it an absolute,
volatile opponent of the capitalist
17
social system.
Along with the Native people, the
oppression of the African people represents the foundation upon which
the capitalist social system rests.
The 19th century philosopher, Karl
Marx, termed this economic relationship "primative accumulation," "an
accumulation not the result of the
capitalist mode of production but its
starting point." The African population exists as a domestic colony
upon which the U.S. capitalist system was founded.
Not only is the black population a
colonial population within the belly of
the U.S., a factor with explosive
social connotations in and of itself,
the African population is also essentially working class in social composition. Estimates of the working
class composition of the black population range from 88 to 94 percent.
Moreover, the ideological foundation of U.S. and world capitalism
has, as its basis, the material foundation of U.S. and world capitalism.
Racism or white nationalism, the ideological foundation of U.S. and world
capitalism led by U.S. capitalism,
has as its basis "primitive accumulation," the material foundation of the
U.S. and world capitalist social system.
The class struggle against the
capitalist-colonialist social system is
centered in the colonized African
population within the U.S. The colonized African population within the
U.S. constitutes the true proletariat,
the working class that, through its
own experience in life, has come to
understand that the bourgeois parties are opposed to the interests of
black working people.
When the black working class
was organized into its own party in
the sixties, when the Black Panther
Party was the legitimate representative of the black working class, the
black working class presented such
a formidable opponent to the U.S.
capitalist social system that the chief
of the secret police arm of the bourgeois State declared the Black
Panther Party the greatest threat to
the internal security of the U.S. since
the Civil War.
When the black working class
was organized into its own party in
the sixties, with its class and national
interests summed up in the form of
political program opposed to bourgeois rule, the Democratic and
Republican parties had to call into
force the repressive arms of the capitalist-colonialist
State. The
Democratic and Republican parties
of the bourgeoisie were incapable of
engaging in successful ideological
and non-violent political struggle with
the black working class.
Indeed it took an all-out urban war
against the black working class in the
sixties for the re-achievement of capitalist class peace and the current
facade of a two-party system representing the class interests of all the
people.
This war saw the black workers
stand up alone against armed regular police organizations as well as
the armed forces usually reserved for
U.S. foreign policy intervention. In
Detroit this included the 82nd
Airborne Division. And in urban
areas throughout the U.S. military
tanks and an assortment of other
Continued on following page
18
Continued from previous page
sophisticated military armaments
were deployed against the unarmed
black working class communities.
In addition to the immediate task
of putting down a massive movement
with insurrectionary characteristics
similar to that presently occurring in
occupied Azania (South Africa), the
military offensive of the capitalistcolonialist ruling class (directed by
the Democratic and Republican parties on various levels) was designed
to destroy the class organizations of
the black working class, to destroy
the indepedent black working class
organizations, and particularly to
destroy the Black Panther Party.
The U.S. ruling class used its military power, its State power, to crush
the independent, revolutionary
capacity of the black working class,
the only social force which made it
necessary to defend the capitalist
social system, the only social force
which was capable of challenging the
bourgeoisie for power , the fundamental question for any revolution.
For most of the sixteen years subsequent to the military defeat of the
Black Revolution of the Sixties the
bourgeoisie has expended a tremendous amount of energy and
resources in keeping the black working class politically disoriented and
disorganized — unable to come
together organizationally in its own
class interests.
The methods for this have ranged
from open white ruling class bribery
of non-proletarian social forces to
naked terror against the black working class itself. Evidence of the black
working class in the popular culture
has nearly disappeared. Michael
Jackson, Jesse Jackson, Prince, and
Lionel Ritchie have become the
stereotypes of the acceptable African
within the U.S. On the occasions
when black working class elements
are allowed to emerge as acceptable, it is as followers of Jesse
Jackson into the Democratic party or
as fictionalized pathetic, poor black
working class children who make it
out of capitalist-colonialist poverty
through being adopted by well-to-do
white petty bourgeois families.
A significant sector of the liberal
black petty bourgeoisie accepted
neo-colonial roles in the bourgeois
Democratic party as payoff in material resources and prestige for administrating the black working class in
areas where white direct colonial rule
would be unacceptable to the black
working class masses. While the
Jesse Jackson presidential campaign was the highest expression of
this manifestation, the bombing of a
black working class community in
Philadelphia by a black mayor and a
black city manager was the sharpest
expression of the political significance of this manifestation.
The white women's and homosexual movements have become virtual scabs on the Black Revolution,
offering themselves up for part of the
booty of parasitic capitalism,
demanding and receiving favors and
privileges as their price for class
peace under capitalism. Not only
are these movements incapable of
raising up and supporting the Black
Liberation Movement which is the
quintessence of the class struggle
within the U.S., they are also
absolutely incapable of raising the
THE BURNING SPEAR
question of women's oppression
within the context of class, the only
way such oppression will ever be
overcome.
The black petty bourgeois neocolonialist puppets and the women's
and homosexual movements are
conscious opportunist movements
which offer up the battered carcass
of the collective black working class
to the altar of capitalism as offerings
of class peace for the privileges of
themselves as anti-proletariat social
forces. They all attempt to mute and
obscure class struggle and call on
the people to join with the
Democratic party to acheive their
aims.
not distinguish its main task from its
general aim. Hence the "task" of
party-building has for all practical
purposes, become its general aim,
and the slogan of party-building is
used to obscure class struggle, to
maintain the class peace which is
necessary for successful bourgeois
colonialist rule.
For the African People's Socialist
Party, fundamental to the task of
Party-building is the need to smash
the class peace. Otherwise, sectors
of the black working class might
remain ensconsed within the
Democratic party of the bourgeoisie.
Otherwise those African workers who
have turned their backs on the two
Huey P. Newton (left) co-founder of the Black Panther Party and Omali
Yeshitela (right) co-founder of the African People’s Socialist Party. In the
African People’s Socialist Party, the African working class experiences again
its own party representing its own interests.
This is the general condition that
the black working class has been
struggling to overcome for the last 16
years. With the defeat of the Black
Revolution of the Sixties, our independent working class organizations
were destroyed and the mass of
black workers disorganized and dispersed. A variety of petty bourgeois
social forces, mostly tied to the
Democratic party, has united with the
white ruling class in assuring class
peace. This means the muting of
class struggle which has the interests of the black working class at its
center.
It is within this context that the
existence and struggle of the African
People's Socialist Party acheive significance.
Organized in 1972 from surviving
black working class organizations of
the sixties, the African People's
Socialist Party has been striving to
pull the best elements of the class
back together after our defeat of the
sixties. While we are a revolutionary
Party, we understand that our task
for the period is not to make the
Revolution, but to build the revolutionary capacity of the only consistently revolutionary social force
within U.S. borders, the black working class. This means that our primary task is to build the African
People's Socialist Party itself.
However, having said this, we
must also talk about our strategy for
building a truly revolutionary working
class Party. This is necessary
because at least one petty bourgeois
U.S.-based African organization
claims party-building as its main
task. This party does this in a fashion which does
Building the APSP
parties of the bourgeois colonialists
will be unable to see that it is not
enough to turn our backs on the
bourgeoisie, but that we must join
and support our own independent
parties in order to achieve our own
separate class interests.
Therefore, for the African
People's Socialst Party, the task of
Party-building is always of a process
which is deeply rooted in solving the
concrete, that is to say, practical,
problems of the Revolution for the
period. Obviously one of these
problems, indeed a key, even fundamental problem is the reorganization
of the black working class into its
own independent revolutionary
Party. Thus, we are not talking about
the task of Party-building for its own
sake. For us the task of Party-building is for the purpose of solving the
most fundamental problems of the
Revolution.
Nor is this simply a play on words.
We are informed of the practical
problems of the Revolution by our
ability to sum up the period in which
we live and assume the task of
Party-building.
Such a summation informs us that
objective conditions for revolution
are ripe. The U.S. capitalist-colonialist class is engaged in several
undeclared wars, in pursuit of which
the ruling class is itself divided.
The conditions of existence for
the black working class is reaching
new, even higher, levels of desperation, and the use of overt police terror against the colonially oppressed
black workers is becoming more blatant every day.
The general crisis of imperialism,
of which the above are evidence,
and which the election of Ronald
May 2003
Wilson Reagan as U.S. president
was designed to confront, continues
unabated, nationally and internationally.
However, it is in the area of subjective forces where the revolutionary prospects are weak. Key to this
weakness is the general state of disorganization of the black working
class. This state of disorganization
is facilitated by opportunism on every
level: by so-called revolutionary parties which are fearful of class struggle and black working class hegemony over our own movement; by
silver-tongued, bourgeois-sponsored, neo-colonialist black petty
bourgeois stooges whose prestige,
appearance of power, and material
resources are dependent upon their
ability to speak for the masses of
unorganized black workers; by the
"communists" and "socialists," and
"leftists" of all stripes, who can wear
such appellations only for so long as
the black working class is voiceless
and cannot impress our own version
of class truth upon the political life of
the U.S. nation-state; by the
women's and homosexual movements and by every social force
which remembers the undiluted
power of the Black Revolution of the
Sixties, with the same fear and trepidation as the U.S. bourgeoisie in
whose interests they faithfully serve.
Therefore, in practical terms ,
Party-building means, first and foremost, concrete work designed to
activate the best of the class into
political motion around concrete programs with the immediate aim of
achieving absolute political hegemony over our movement and class
in the process. Therefore Partybuilding means providing leadership
for the class even when the Party is
small and has not yet fully achieved
its desired capacity.
For example, although a small
Party, the African People's Socialist
Party has been able to ignite a movement in Oakland, California which is
daily achieving a social character.
This movement, with the Party at its
center has been able to mobilize
social forces of various nationalities
into the service of the black working
class and away from absolute unity
with the bourgeois colonialists.
Among the forces mobilized by
the Party are elements of the black
working class, who although not in
the Party, are capable (due to the
Party's leadership) of enhancing
their organized fighting capacity
around real, concrete, social needs.
This movement has successfully
challenged the basic assumptions of
bourgeois property relations and, for
the first time since the sixties, has
put the bourgeoisie on the political
defensive in a struggle with the black
working class.
In addition the African People's
Socialist Party was able to put an initiative on the electoral ballot in
Oakland which won 25,000 votes,
which was 20 percent of the total
cast. Thus, a small Party, in the
process of Party-building, was able
to provide leadership for African and
other working class elements which
is greatly disproportionate to our
physical size. But more than this,
the voters who were won to a working class stance in that election had
to go against the leadership of the
May 2003
THE BURNING SPEAR
Continued from previous page
bourgeois colonialist parties with
whom they are registered.
The Party-building process must
awaken the black working class to
practical participation in its own political life. Hence concrete struggle,
real, practical leadership of the class
is a must, even when building the
Party. But all concrete, practical
participation will not be within the
Party itself. The Party must be capable of mobilizing and leading the various social forces of various nationalities into strategic motion if it is to be
worthy of the name "party."
Therefore, even when we are
confronted with a period such as
today — when the last significant
political lesson to be summed up by
the black working class is military
defeat, and although obviously restless, the masses of black workers
have not yet concluded that their
own interests as summed up and
concretized in the Party, are worth
the risk of life and liberty as suggested by membership in the Party
— black workers must still have the
leadership of the Party available to
them and must still be able to claim
the Party as their own.
The African People's Socialist
Party is engaged in a Party-building
process and we think the people
should have some idea of what that
means.
The black working class and our
allies should have some idea of what
parties are and what it is they do,
what their functions are. We think
our supporters should have a better
grip on what it is you support and
whether your support is what it
needs to be.
In the first place we are a revolutionary black working class Party, the
only such Party in the U.S. We are
organized together around a common General Program and policies
which were arrived at during our First
Party Congress, which is the highest
organization of the Party and is comprised of representatives of the entire
membership.
Our General Program and our
policies are the practical, concrete,
representatives of our revolutionary
theory of African Internationalism.
African Internationalism is Pan
Africanism developed to its highest
stage, Pan Africanism during the age
of imperialism, Pan Africanism which
united the African workers of the
world in a revolutionary process in
unity with the revolutionary aspirations of all the workers of the world.
theory
of
African
The
Internationalism is ever developing
with the new experiences of the
international working class, African
and otherwise. It is based on a scientific method of investigating and
analyzing social life and the particular characteristics its development
has acquired for African people
whose current oppressive circumstances have their bases in the slave
trade which was a fundamental fea-
The opposition of
the African People's
Socialist Party to
the U.S.
government and
the capitalist social
system which rests
on our colonial
oppression is total
and absolute.
There are no
circumstances
under which we
would ever find the
foreign domination
of our people or
the economic
exploitation of our
class acceptable.
ture in the development of world capitalism.
The scientific method of investigating social life employed by the
African People's Socialist Party is
Iraq
ing terrorism, as well as on containing Iran and Syria," the New York
Times reported.
Bremer has long called for a very
hard line against "extremist Islam"
and for aggressive tactics, including
assassination, in pursuing and preempting "suspected terrorists,"
writes the Asia Times. He is the head
of several corporate boards and
chaired the National Commission on
Terrorism in 1999. In 2000 Bremer
became chairman and chief executive of the Crisis Consulting Practice
of Marsh Inc. and has warned clients
about the "danger posed to businesses operating overseas from
growing income gaps and social tensions," according to one report.
"Over the past 30 years, 80 percent of terrorist attacks against the
United States have been aimed at
American businesses”, Bremer wrote
after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks. "The
end of the Cold War has unleashed
long-submerged ethnic and religious
tensions in Europe, Africa and Asia."
In January, 2003, Bremer wrote in
a Washington Times newspaper column entitled "Charting a Course for
War," that: "This fight cannot be won
on the defensive, so we must go on
the offensive. To be blunt, we have to
kill the terrorists before they kill us."
He called for the formation of a
domestic counterterrorist intelligence
agency.
In mid-May the Pentagon’s team
in Iraq headed by General Jay
Garner was abruptly pulled out,
despite earlier assertions by
Rumsfeld that Garner would remain
Garner under criticism
Retired General Jay Garner (r) was replaced by retired diplomat Lewis Paul
Bremer III (l) as “administrator” over Iraq to cover up the obvious colonial
occupation.
in Baghdad, reporting to Bremer.
Barbara Bodine, who was in charge
of the Baghdad region was also
given 3 days to pack up and get out.
The New York Times reported that
Bremer had "long had misgivings
about Bodine’s appointment."
Former vice chief of staff of the
U.S. army, Garner’s appointment as
overseer of Iraq generated so much
opposition that it has its own website,
StopJayGarner.com.
Known to be arrogant, rude and
blatantly white nationalist, Garner is
hated by the Iraqi people. Public services and electricity were not
restored to Baghdad under Garner
and he failed to involve them in planning the new government as he
promised. Garner was, according to
the St. Petersburg Times, "under
heavy criticism for being almost
invisible to ordinary Iraqis," never
emerging from behind U.S. barbed
wire security fences. British journalist
Robert Fisk speculates that, "some
of the worst tyrants and torturers of
the old regime are probably being
employed by the Garner administration, with no questions asked."
A staunch pro-Israeli, Garner was
until a few weeks before his appointment the president of SY Coleman, a
leading defense contractor working
on missile systems used to bomb
Baghdad and by Israel against the
Palestinian people. Garner ’s
appointment was a flagrant colonialist insult to the Iraqi people: the same
person who designed the bombs that
killed them is now their ruler.
Garner’s 34-year military career
included a stint as the commanding
General of the Army’s Space and
Strategic Defense Command, part of
the Star Wars program begun by
Ronald Reagan.
During his watch as president of
SY Technology Garner faced allegations that company had received
$100 million in defense contracts
without undergoing competitive bidding, due to his Pentagon contacts.
In October 2000, Garner signed
his name to a Zionist statement that,
"Israel had exercised remarkable
19
called dialectical and historical materialism. By dialectical we mean that
our approach to the investigation of
all phenomena is all-sided, considering past and present, and the relation of phenomena in motion to all
other phenomena, even as phenomena comes into being and dies out of
existence. By materialism we mean
that our analysis, our interpretation
of phenomena receives its information from the investigation of the phenomena itself that it does not acquire
an explanation of phenomena outside the phenomena. By historical
materialism we mean the application
of the principles of dialectical materialism to the investigation and interpretation of social life.
The opposition of the African
People's Socialist Party to the U.S.
government and the capitalist social
system which rests on our colonial
oppression is total and absolute.
There are no circumstances under
which we would ever find the foreign
domination of our people or the economic exploitation of our class
acceptable. We are convinced that
capitalism, the social system built off
the slave trade and the theft of life,
liberty, and resources of the nonEuropean peoples of the world,
where the world's resources are concentrated in Europe and the U.S.
and are owned and controlled by a
minority of non-working capitalists, is
on its death bed.
see Spear, page 20
restraint in the face of lethal violence
orchestrated by the leadership of the
Palestinian Authority."
Also playing crucial roles in the
colonization of Iraq are the brutal
U.S. stooges Ahmad Chalabi and
Zalmay Khalilzad, the U.S. "special
envoy" to both Afghanistan and Iraq.
Khalilzad is also the National
Security Council’s "Special Assistant
for the Gulf, Southwest Asia and
other Regional issues."
Both Khalilzad and Chalabi are
tied to the Unocal oil company. With
his CIA connections, Khalilzad engineered Hamid Karzai's installation as
the new Afghani chief. In the 1980’s
Khalilzad played an important role in
setting up Islamic Fundamentalism
throughout the Middle East and in
Afghanistan to fight the former Soviet
Union. Khalilzad was also involved in
the atrocities in Bosnia and fostered
the connections with the drug and
arms dealing Northern Alliance.
It is clear that the U.S.. imperialist
plan is to recolonize not only Iraq, but
all oppressed peoples and nations
on the earth so that the world’s
remaining natural resources can be
easily controlled by white power and
U.S. power can go unchallenged.
The actions of the U.S. government
are those of a desperate and dying
imperialism, weakened by the struggles of oppressed peoples all over
the world and inside this country for
national liberation and self-determination.
As African People’s Socialist
Party Chairman Omali Yeshitela has
stated, the current situation is dangerous but favorable to African and
oppressed peoples. The U. S. imperialists are not able to rule in the
same old way and the majority of
humanity on the planet has a pro-
see Iraq, page 21
20
THE BURNING SPEAR
Opinion
of the United States, since WWI.
Some of the voices have been A.
Phillip Randolph, Elijah Muhammad,
Bayard Rustin, Paul Robeson,
W.E.B. DuBois, Lucy Parsons,
Claudia Jones, Dr. King and Malcolm
X, to name a few.
In more recent times, Minister
Louis Farrakhan and our fallen comrade Kwame Ture certainly have
played their role fighting military
repression and violence. Secondly,
at times our organizations criticize
each other about not taking positions
concerning this issue instead of discussing when our organizations that
are willing to build the most inclusive
coalition around this issue possible
can come together and complete this
long and overdue task.
Another concern is the tactic of
confining our political education
efforts to responding to the propaganda of the government about the
countries featured on television, in
Spear
We believe that the future belongs
to the dispossessed workers of the
world who, when armed with a revolutionary theory and led by a revolutionary Party, represent the conscious, subjective forces of history
necessary for the overthrow of capitalism and the advent of a new social
system organized under the leadership of the working masses, the real
producers of all material wealth.
This new social system will end
production for profit and rule by a
non-working minority whose private
ownership and control of the means
of production guarantee such authority.
We believe that the new social
system which will follow capitalism,
the one the white ruling class and all
its hangers-on attempt to suppress
with the oppression of the black
working class, is communism — a
social system which demands labor
according to ability and guarantees
the material resources of life and its
reproduction according to need.
Thus we recognize that the
African People's Socialist Party, the
advanced, conscious detachment of
the black working class, is, like the
class itself, locked in a life-and-death
battle with the U.S. capitalist social
system.
Hence, the members of our Party
must represent the advanced sector
of the black working class. They
must constantly strive for a discipline
that is steeled by conviction and that
is self-induced.
As the advanced detachment of
the black working class, the African
People's Socialist Party assumes the
responsibility for advancing the
cause of the whole class which at
any given time may be battered by
ignorance, drug addiction, alcoholism, demoralization, etc.
Hence, the members of the
African People's Socialist Party must
become professional revolutionaries,
individuals whose real profession is
revolution and whose vehicle for carrying our their profession is the
newspapers, internet, radio and
other information sources. If U.S.
imperialism was an animal it would
be an octopus.
While Palestine, Iraq, Afghanistan
and North Korea have dominated the
news, the assassination of
Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe
is being planned. Hugo Chavez in
Venezuela could easily end up like
Allende in Chile in 1973.
The people in Colombia, where
Africans make up over 45 percent of
the population, are feeling the wrath
of Plan Colombia — the latest U.S.
military adventure. The attempt to
create an opposition party in Cuba is
being carefully orchestrated with the
help of the anti-Castro terrorists in
Miami.
A permanent effort against military repression and violence is necessary and should be connected with
the resistance against police brutality
within the United States, which is
nothing but the continuation of the
struggle to merge the experiences of
those who endured both chattel slavery and colonialism.
The U.S. war on terrorism is the
African People's Socialist Party, the
organization of professional revolutionaries.
The African People's Socialist
Party recognizes that the colonially
oppressed African workers are the
most consistently revolutionary
social force within the U.S., but that
the African working class will not
achieve revolutionary working class
consciousness on its own accord,
that alone the African working class
will at best acheive nationalist consciousness.
Therefore, it is the task of the
African People's Socialist Party, even
as it is being developed to full capacity, to intervene in the day-to-day
struggles of the African working
class, to forge deep lines in struggle
and to lead the class to an ever
higher, ever closer understanding of
African Internationalism, the science
of black workers' revolution.
In such a Party as the African
People's Socialist Party, a revolutionary African Internationalist Party
based on a revolutionary working
class theory, a Party of professional
revolutionaries, all distinctions
between workers and intellectuals,
laborer and "professional" lose their
significance as we are welded into
one by the common cause of a proletarian future that is being advanced
by the Party of the colonially
oppressed African working class.
On one side stands the bourgeoisie and all the institutions which
latest aggression against Socialist
and Islamic forces all over the world.
The legacy of J Edgar Hoover and
McCarthy is alive and well within the
hearts of the current government officials.
The fact that we are only 12 percent of the population but still make
up 22 percent of military personnel
should make anyone who dismisses
charges of genocide as extreme and
far-fetched think again.
The other dynamic that should
grab our attention collectively is that
Uncle Sam is not satisfied. Our
actors and actresses will be asked to
play in more military movies to show
their patriotism.
Former conscientious objectors,
like Imam Warith Deen Muhammad,
will be asked to continue to encourage Muslims to join the ranks of the
military to show they aren't sympathetic to those who practice the same
religion they do who are labeled terrorists.
ROTC and JROTC will be
boosted at the junior high and high
schools we have traditionally
attended. Spike Lee will be asked to
serve to preserve its rule. On the
other side stands the international
working class and the Party of its
most advanced representatives, the
African People's Socialist Party.
Together, these two social forces
represent the great contest of our
days. Seperately they represent the
past and the future. The conscious
representatives of these two great
social forces are choosing sides.
Every day makes such a choice by
the black working class and our allies
a critical choice.
The bourgeoisie will not explain
the relationship of political parties to
class struggle in the manner we have
just done. Most of the so-called revolutionary parties are incapable of
doing so. But for us the matter is
clear. The future will prevail. The
urgent matter is for all those who
have thought they have enjoyed a
neutral seat as spectators in this
contest, to take up the call, to Take
the Great Leap Forward and grab the
future in your hands to help shape
and mold it in this lifetime for this
generation.
Those who can must join the
African People's Socialist Party;
those who cannot must support us.
BUILD THE REVOLUTIONARY
PARTY OF THE AFRICAN WORKING CLASS!
BUILD THE AFRICAN PEOPLE'S
SOCIALIST PARTY!
May 2003
do more public relations campaigns
for the Navy and magazines like
Black Enterprises will continue to run
recruitment ads by the army like the
one in their March edition showcasing the Company 24 regiment who
fought in Korea.
These examples illustrate that we
don't have the luxury of waiting until
the United States is on the verge of a
war, operation or invasion to flood
the streets of major cities with
demonstrations which are planned
for the most part by a network external to our community. We can't wait
for grant money and employment
opportunities with health insurance
plans where protesting war is in your
job description.
The historical obligation to harmonize theory and practice, improve our
communication and Pan African and
International movement against military repression and violence
remains.
Obi Egbuna is a member of the Pan
African Liberation Organization based in
Washington, D.C. [email protected]
Johnny Union
Despite being forced to eat slop for
food, he fights on. Despite not having been allowed to see one person
from his family since he was locked
up almost 11 years ago, he fights
on. Despite spending the last
33,580 hours out of a total of 35,040
hours in solitary confinement, he
fights on.
He is able to fight and will not
stop because the spirit of historical
African resistance runs through his
veins. This spirit of resistance runs
through us all. That is why we must
come to his defense and fight for his
freedom.
Let this battle serve the
International African Revolution as
another step on the path towards
national liberation and self-determination for African people. Our land,
our birthright, our wealth, our home,
our future is Africa in the hands of
the African workers and poor peasants.
Defeat Imperialist White
Power!
We Stand in Unity With
Johnny Union.
Join the African People’s
Socialist Party!
Our Freedom is Ours to Make!
The International African Revolution is at Hand!
Conference on
July 25 - 27, 2003
London, England
for more info contact
the African People’s Socialist Party in the US:
727.821.6620 or [email protected]
or in Britian:
020.8265.1731 or [email protected]
Build the
African Socialist International!
May 2003
THE BURNING SPEAR
Al-Arian
visitors, telephone, attorney and family. When he receives a visit from his
public defender, his hands are cuffed
behind his back, making it impossible
for him to bring his legal documents
with him.
Excerpts from a statement Dr. AlArian made before Judge McCoun at
his arraignment on April 7, 2003,
read, "The confinement conditions
that I am put under are of such enormity that they've effectively denied
me any opportunity to [assemble a
legal team and organize my
defense]. I was told that I'd have only
one 15 minute phone call per month.
(At Orient Road Jail, one hour per
day phone use is allowed). I was told
that I could make one 10 minute
phone call either to my family or to
my attorney, but not to both, with my
hands behind my back in handcuffs.
"That Friday, I had a non-contact
visit with my family. I prepared a list
of things to follow up with, especially
concerning the legal representation
and the funding. However, before I
was taken to the visitation area, the
guard took my notes and pencil. I
was taken to the non-contact visitation room with my family, and I tried
to recall from memory what I wanted
my family to do. However, apparently, someone saw through the
camera in the room that my wife was
writing something, again, they came
barging into the room from both
sides, and within five minutes, they
had confiscated the paper and pen
and threatened that if they ever saw
anyone bring a pen or paper or write
anything, all visits would be cancelled.
"I, along with my other co-defendants, [continued] our requests for
legal phone calls. Several other
prison inmates who sympathized
with our plight started protesting the
denial of our requests by throwing
their food trays in the hallway, putting
their hands outside the openings or
the traps so that the guards would
not be able to close them, and in one
instance, one inmate put his bed
sheet around the iron gate so it
would not open until the Lieutenant
showed up. When the Lieutenant
showed up, he was told that there
was a protest against the denial of
our legal calls. It was then that we
were allowed to make phone calls."
Africans and our families — who
are imprisoned at an enormously dis-
SFPD
As The Burning Spear goes to
press, the dates of the court hearings
for the three officers charged with
felony assault on the white citizens,
and the five officers who assaulted
the African youth have not been
made public. The indictments
against the top command officers for
conspiracy have been dropped.
While it is obvious to everyone that a
cover-up took place, the DA was
unable to prove the more technical
charge of "conspiracy." A police
cover-up is a common occurrence,
but since the charge of conspiracy
does not revolve around African militants or other radicals challenging
proportionate rate as part of the U.S.
government's counterinsurgency
program to militarily contain our
oppressed and colonized people —
will find these prison conditions familiar. We experience them daily in the
U.S. concentration camps called
prisons, whether we are the heroic
political prisoners who have devoted
our lives to the freedom struggle of
our people or the everyday Africans
who are denied the human right to
economic and political self-determination.
Clearly the isolation of prisoners
from their families, attorneys and
supporters constitutes a denial of
due process of law, preventing them
from participating in the organization
of their own defense.
Well respected in his community
and among progressives, Dr. Sami
Al-Arian should be just the kind of
case that civil liberties groups should
be jumping to support in this chilling
era of escalating attacks on free
speech rights. But where are groups
like the ACLU?
ACLU member Dwight Lawton
has been trying to get his local
Pinellas County ACLU chapter,
headed by Paul Pohlman and Ray
Arsenault to come forward in support
of Al-Arian for over two months.
Lawton is an anti-war activist who
has spent time in prison for civil disobedience protests against the U.S.
mercenary training camp in Georgia,
called the School of the Americas
(aka School of Assassins). Failing to
win support from his local chapter, he
has written to Howard Simon, the
Florida ACLU Executive Director and
to the ACLU National Office, with no
response. He is presently attempting
to contact the Center for
Constitutional Rights in Washington,
D.C. Dr. Al-Arian's son, Abdullah, has
also sent requests to the ACLU and
Amnesty International with no
response.
We have seen the ACLU bring
cons iderable resources to the
defense of the free speech rights of
the Ku Klux Klan, and other causes.
In the face of thousands of Arabs
locked up without being charged and
tens of thousands interrogated and
intimidated, we see little to no action
or outcry on the part of the ACLU.
This is the true challenge for civil libertarians today.
Since 9/11, the organization has
reportedly gained vast numbers of
new members and a tremendous
influx of resources from people who
are deeply concerned about the
the State, it requires definite proof
that the individual officers met and
talked and planned to conspire to
protect some of their own. To any
thinking person, it is obvious this
happened.
Consistent with the colonial history of "the good old white boy" network at the SFPD, Alex Fagan Sr.
has been rewarded for his history of
misdeeds, the most recent being the
cover-up of his son's crimes. Neocolonial African Chief Sanders, who
has a long history of brutality against
the residents of Hunters Point/Bay
View and is currently out on disability
leave, has paid homage to white
power by promoting Alex Fagan Sr.
to be the acting police chief.
The actions of the San Francisco
Police Department are consistent
21
What you can do!
Write to Judge Thomas B.
McCoun III, U.S. District Court,
801 North Florida Ave., Tampa,
FL 33602 and ask:
Why Al-Arian has not received
permission to defend himself.
That he be moved closer to
family and lawyers and granted
due process rights to prepare
for his trial, including full
access to the law library and
telephone.
Ask Donald McKelvy, Warden,
U.S. Penitentiary, PO Box
1023, Coleman, FL 33521
Phone: 352-689-3003; fax:
352-689-3003 and
Harley G. Lappin, Director, U.S.
Bureau of Prisons, 320 First
Street, N.W., Washington, D.C.
20534 Phone: 202-3073250; fax: 202-514-6878
Why Al-Arian is in solitary,
frequently strip-searched and
denied more than occasional
use of phone.
Why he has only limited
access to the law library and
why there are no reference
materials he needs to prepare
his case.
Why he cannot obtain pencils.
If he is not convicted of a
crime, why should he be in
Coleman?
Ask the ACLU, ACLUFL and the
local ACLU Pinellas why they
haven't at least issued a press
release statement on the violation of Al-Arian's due
process and offered him legal
help.
Nadine Strossen, President and
Anthony D. Romero, Executive
Director, 125 Broad St., 18th
attack on civil liberties under the
Patriot Act and the "war on terrorism". The defense of Dr. Sami AlArian must be a priority for civil libertarians and all freedom-loving people.
In addition to legal support, the
with the actions of police departments throughout the U.S. when it
comes to African people. The police
are arms of a colonial State. They
function as the first line of defense of
the oppressive status quo. They are
there to crush the revolutionary aspirations of the people to be free and
independent even when the people
are not conscious of their own interests in striving for freedom and independence.
It is the task of our Party and of
African militants in general to expose
the real nature of our relationship
with the police and to organize to
build the African People's Socialist
Party as the political army of the
oppressed African masses.
Floor, NYC, NY,10004;
212.549.2500 or to send feedback by email:
http://www.aclu.org/feedback/feedback.cfm
Howard Simon, Executive
Director, ACLU, FL, 4500
Biscayne Blvd., Suite 340,
Miami, FL 33137
PH: 305-576- 2336;
[email protected]
Paul Pohlman, President, ACLU
Pinellas, PO Box 12372, St.
Petersburg, FL 33733; 727821-9494
[email protected]
Paul Rebein, Director, ACLUFL,
c/o Shook, Hardy and Bacon,
100 No. Tampa, Suite 2900,
Tampa, FL 33602; 813-2027100
Write letters to the editors,
including to the St. Petersburg
Times at [email protected]
and the Tampa Tribune at [email protected]
Write, email or call your
Senators and U.S.
Representative.
Ask them why Al-Arian is
being inhumanely treated at
Coleman and why he is being
denied reasonable access to
telephone, lawyers and family
in preparing for his trial.
Dr. Al-Arian needs financial
assistance. Please contribute
to his defense fund by mailing
a check to :
National Liberty Fund , PO Box
22580, Alexandria, Virginia
22304
Note on check "Al-Arian
Defense Fund."
family of Dr. Al-Arian and his supporters have asked all those who
want to defend the rights of Arab and
all peoples to freedom of speech
without fear of imprisonment to voice
your concerns.
Iraq
found interest in the destruction of
the parasitic imperialist system.
Built on a pedestal of the
enslavement of African people, the
genocide of indigenous peoples and
the theft of the land and resources
of the majority of the earth, imperialism will be brought down by an
organized force of African workers
and our allies of oppressed and colonized peoples throughout the
world.
In our struggle for African
Independence in our lifetime, the
stands in solidarity with the people
of Iraq. Uhuru!
22
THE BURNING SPEAR
PEOPLE’S RESISTANCE
IN
May 2003
LATIN AMERICA
Unión del Barrio
on
The People’s Resistance in Latin
Harry Simón of Unión del Barrio
The following presentation was made at
the Uhuru House, office of the African
People’s Socialist Party on March 9,
2003, at a regular Sunday community
mass meeting.
BY HARRY SIMÓN
We, in Unión del Barrio, came
from the Chicano Movement, but our
roots and our spirit and our political
culture are very much linked to the
movements of South America —
Latin America in general, and of
course, particularly in Mexico.
We don’t see ourselves as separate from the Mexican National
Liberation Movement in the south.
We see ourselves as a continuation
to the northern front of the Mexican
National Liberation Movement within
Mexico.
That’s not just an ideological
statement. It’s a practical commitment, an organizational commitment
within a lot of the national liberation
coalitions and frentes. They call it a
frente process, which is very common in Latin America.
It’s a united front that’s come out
of Mexico. We’ve participated as
northern sectors of the Mexican
National Liberation Movement. It’s
one sector of our work. Part of that
work is traveling and introducing ourselves and promoting relationships
as fruitful — I don’t know if that’s possible — as the relationship with the
Uhuru Movement, with our brothers
and sisters in the southern part of our
hemisphere.
That’s led to a lot of traveling for
our compañeros y compañeras.
Obviously there’s always travel to
Mexico, whether it be for purely political causes or to visit family. All of us
have our families for the most part in
Mexico proper. So, it’s an ongoing
relationship.
Last year, in 2002 and early 2003,
we dedicated a lot of time and
energy to going into South America,
because right now South America is
on the cutting edge of the world revolution for oppressed people. It’s on
the cutting edge! We know from what
we saw and what we experienced in
South America that this is a beautiful
and intense transformation of every
level of society.
I want to go briefly into the overall
situation in South America, but focus
on Venezuela.
Brazil
I hope you all understand, especially Africans in the crowd, Brazil is
an African country. You have to
understand that. Brazil is an African
country! I’m not just saying that
because they think of themselves as
African, but in terms of the culture
itself. It’s African and you can see it!
It permeates every aspect of the
country.
Brazil is just coming out of one of
the most horrendous dictatorships
suffered in South America. For so
many years, you never heard of any
kind of huge mass struggle in Brazil,
but you always did hear about mass
poverty and the terrible injustice the
Brazilian
people
suffered.
Throughout this time, the only thing
you heard about Brazil was sexy
women on beaches in G-strings and
soccer and Samba, right? If you are
the kind of person who got your information from the news, that’s all you
heard.
In fact, beginning in the late `70s
going into the `80s, a compañero
who was nicknamed "Lula," Ignácio
da Silva being his real name, organized from the base upwards. He
connected to the movements of the
past, of course, but he also organized from the base upwards. He
organized a party called Partido dos
Trabalhadores (PT), or Workers
Party.
He has run for election about
eight times. He was not able to win
any of those times. In the election
before the last, he actually had won,
but had his election stolen.
In the most recent election, the
corruption couldn’t cover up his victory. Fifty-two million Brazilians voted
for Ignácio da Silva, "Lula." Fifty-two
million! That means he’s the most
democratically elected official, government official or institutional official, in the Western hemisphere,
maybe in the world.
Fifty-two million people supported
his party — which is a Socialist party
that promotes socialism — on a platform with a fundamental priority for
feeding, educating and providing
healthcare for Brazil’s masses. It is a
platform for changing and overturning the structures of oppression in
Brazil. This is the promise of Lula.
This is the vision of the PT.
They won with the support of
another very important group:
Movimiento Los Sin Tierra, (MST)
which loosely translates to the
Movement of Non-Landowning
Peasants. He has the masses of
workers and peasants as his base.
They will hold Lula accountable
whether or not Lula wants to be held
accountable.
Brazil is the eighth largest economy in the world. I believe it has a
nuclear capacity. What you might
have at one time assumed was a
backward former colony, is now
called "el Caballero de Esperanza"
throughout Latin America. They call
Lula and the process in Brazil "the
Horseman of Hope" or "the Hope of
Latin America." That’s one of the
Horsemen. Because, you know,
horsemen always come in groups. I’ll
talk about the other Horsemen.
That’s what’s happening in Brazil.
I emphasize again that Brazil is
an African country. Please don’t forget that. This is part of the Uhuru
struggle. Whether or not the Uhuru
Movement is on the ground there or
not is irrelevant. This is part of the
Uhuru struggle!
Please, keep an eye on Lula. As
soon as you are informed and start
forming opinions let us know,
because we’re watching that very
closely. Right now we support Lula
and we support the process.
Now understand
something: death,
misery and hunger
are what the current
government offers
the Colombian
people. Education, a
future and hope are
what the guerrillas
offer the Colombian
people. The policy of
the U.S. is to hold a
gun to the Colombian
people’s head,
forcing them to
decide to side with
Alvaro Uribe.
Colombia
In Colombia, the Fuerzas
Armadas Revolucionarias de
Colombia (FARC) is the oldest, the
best armed and the best prepared of
guerilla formations. The name translates loosely into the "Revolutionary
Armed Forces of Colombian
People’s Army." They have been and
are now in control of at least one
third of the country. There is no military defeat for the FARC.
I want to expel the myth and to put
this out to you right now so that you
will understand very clearly. The
FARC are accused of being narcoterrorists, or terrorists dealing in
drugs. I want to put that to rest
because that is not true. It is a fabrication, an absolute fabrication. I want
everyone here to understand that
In San Vicente del Caguan, Colombia — a village in FARC-liberated territory
— a billboard facing the town church reads: "Plan Colombia: The gringos supply the arms and Colombia supplies the dead.
May 2003
THE BURNING SPEAR
LATIN AMERICA
promises to bring about some true
reforms. We expect that this will be
the case whether he likes it or not
because the indigenous people have
spoken through him. It’s not that they
have shut their mouths and stopped
speaking. The fact is, they have chosen to speak through him. You have
to understand the power that he
holds is of the indigenous peoples.
IN
Argentina
The Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (FARC) is one of the oldest
guerilla forces in South America.
there is only one armed group in
Colombia that has lost blood and
shed blood in the fight against the
drug cartels: That is the guerrillas.
That is the FARC.
They’re the only ones that have
gone toe-to-toe and militarily struggled against the drug cartels. It has
been the U.S. government and its
allies under the paramilitaries, led by
a guy named Castaño, and the current president, Alvaro Uribe, who
have united with the drug cartels. In
fact, they have drug warehouses.
There is documented proof that
CIA agents, with President Uribe and
paramilitary groups — which are the
death squads, the ones who tie
dynamite to people’s heads and use
car bombs — have warehouses of
cocaine that they draw from to trot
out and put in front of the television
to say that the war against drugs is
happening. Then they put it back in
the warehouse and they trot it out
again.
This is an agreement between the
drug cartels, the CIA, and the president there, to justify "Plan Colombia,"
which has the U.S. sending billions
of dollars to Colombia to finance, to
back up, to try to promote and hold
up this puppet government in order
to take the power away from the
guerrillas.
Now understand something:
death, misery and hunger are what
the current government offers the
Colombian people. Education, a
future and hope are what the guerrillas offer the Colombian people. The
policy of the U.S. is to hold a gun to
the Colombian people’s head, forcing them to decide to side with Alvaro
Uribe.
So, when you hear the positions
and statements in the media, understand that this is what’s occurring.
Understand they are lying.
Just pay attention to the media
and what they say about the
marches here . When there are
250,000 people, they say there are
25 people. They always at least say
that there are half of what there is. If
these are the lies told when you are
there [at the marches], imagine the
lies they say about things that are
happening in South America or Africa
or Asia. You have to understand that.
You know, sometimes it’s hard for
people to think outside of what you
see on television, because as soon
as it’s projected on you, you think
We’re watching
Gutiérrez very
carefully. He
promises to bring
about some true
reforms. We expect
that this will be
the case whether
he likes it or not
because the
indigenous people
have spoken
through him.
there has to be some semblance of
truth to it. But there’s not.
Ecuador
In Ecuador, another guerilla
leader, Lucio Gutiérrez, just won a
landslide election and assumed
power. In Ecuador, Lucio Gutiérrez
was one of the leaders of what they
called a "coup d’etat." They say it
was a coup d’etat, but actually there
were massive protests in the streets,
led by an indigenous national coalition of Indian people that led to his
election.
Ecuador is an indigenous country.
The people got together in massive
protests and circled the presidential
palace and ejected Jamil Mahuad,
the president at the time. He had
imposed all sorts of terrible austerity
measures — raising prices on everything, lowering salaries and making
poor people send all their money to
the wealthy here in the U.S. and to
the insignificant upper class in
Ecuador.
In fact, Ecuador doesn’t even
have its own currency. They use the
U.S. dollar as their official currency.
That’s how terrible the economic situation was.
Lucio Gutiérrez was the military
support for this indigenous peoples’
protest and recently swept the elections on a people’s program. We’re
watching Gutiérrez very carefully. He
In Argentina, there is total anarchy. The banks have frozen everybody’s assets. The Argentinean people were some of the most "uppity"
people in South America today.
There was this conference where
some of our compañeros were in
South America. The Argentinean delegation used to come in all sliced out
like they had just got in from Paris or
whatever. Now they come in all ragtag. I hate to make fun of them, but
it’s almost like poetic justice in the
case of Argentina, because they
have not played a positive cultural
and historical role within Argentina,
nor as a country.
Of course, Argentina is very
famous for its exports. Its most
famous export was Ernesto "Che"
Guevara. But, Che had to leave
Argentina for the revolution to take
place. That’s another
story, too. Keep an eye
on Argentina. It’s very
volatile there. It can go
either way. We expect
that it will go on the side
of the people.
23
of the imperialist puppets. He’s going
to get them the hell out of Bolivia and
have Bolivia for the Bolivian people.
That was one of his first promises in
his campaign platform.
Of course, the imperialists didn’t
allow him to win after he said that.
They stole the election and they did
not tolerate that kind of speech. I
assume they expected him to tone it
down because it had been beyond a
shadow of a doubt that he was going
to take the election. He did take the
election, and it was stolen from him.
Now there is a very serious crisis
within Bolivia. The current government has absolutely nothing to offer.
They have no legitimacy. It seems
that more likely than not Morales will
have that election recognized one
way or the other.
Venezuela
So that takes me to Venezuela.
Last summer a contingent of compañeros from Unión del Barrio and
supporters — there was 90 of us —
had the opportunity to travel to
Venezuela. We had been tangling
with this issue within Unión del Barrio
to define our position on South
America in general, but Venezuela in
particular, because some changes
had been going down. We weren’t
Peru
In Peru, there’s
another
president,
Alejandro Toledo, on the
ropes. Keep an eye on
Peru. There is a tremendous crisis in Peru and
the indigenous people are
about to seize the time.
Bolivia
Lucio Gutiérrez, president of Ecuador
In Bolivia, keep an eye
on a gentleman by the
sure. There’s no way to be informed
name of Evo Morales. He is the
by word-of-mouth or by literature or
leader of the campesino peasant
by what’s happening on the Internet
farmers union. They present him in
or anything like that. When we did
the U.S. press as the leader of the
get authentic information about
coca growers, where the cocaine
Venezuela, it was so difficult to
comes from. They say, "He’s a drug
understand because it was very
union leader!" But he is a peasant
national in character.
leader, and that includes the peasVenezuela is essentially superants that grow the coca leaves.
important to the industrial situation
Now the coca leaves are not the
because of its oil. Up until 1974,
white stuff that we see on our streets.
Venezuela was the number one oil
Coca leaves go back thousands of
exporter on Earth. In 1974, the
years. Coca is a very precious and
Middle Eastern countries took that
even a ceremonial plant. If any of it
rank away and right now it’s the fifth
gets processed and transported to
largest oil exporter in the world. It’s in
the U.S. as cocaine, it’s not the
the crosshairs of U.S. imperialism.
campesinos that do it. The
It’s very much in the crosshairs and
campesinos barely survive on their
under the pressure of U.S. imperialcoca leaves. It is actually the CIA and
ism.
everybody else. Don’t connect Evo
When they finish — if they finish,
Morales or the FARC with the drugs
hopefully they won’t be able to finish
we have to suffer under in our
— the genocide in Iraq, and I say that
streets. That’s not relevant to any of
with an ironic hesitation because
this discussion.
that’s a frightening idea, they plan to
Evo Morales is an amazing
move on to South America, and more
leader. He came out and said in his
than likely Venezuela will be one of
last presidential campaign that the
first thing he’s going to do is eject all
24
THE BURNING SPEAR
PEOPLE’S RESITANCE
IN
LATIN AMERICA
May 2003
most combative sectors.
They’re coming
They went in there and opened
out
talking.
fire with their machine guns, and
Nobody went to
anybody who was caught in the
work. The prices
streets was "toque de guerra." I think
were all too high
that translates roughly into "martial
on the Metro.
law." Isn’t that martial law when no
So, the people
one has the right to be anywhere, but
came out into the
inside the house? (Audience: yeah).
streets. Some
They opened fire. Official estipeople say that
mates said four hundred people were
by around noon
killed. This was 1989. People who
there
were
experienced it say that there were
50,000
to
10,000 people killed.
100,000 people
Helicopters continuously came
assembled
into the center of the city. One of the
around the "caso
military bases, La Gabota, is in the
de centro" – the
center of the town. Helicopters would
center of the city.
leave loaded with bodies and they
The
city
of
would dump them into the ocean and
Caracas has four
other mass graves. It was one of the
million people. By
most horrible massacres in all of
around 3 or 4
South America and of course in the
people
say
p.m.,
Hundreds of teachers confront riot police in Peru in a protest against the government on May 14,
history of Venezuela – 10,000 peothat
half
the
pop2003.
ple.
ulation of the city
their targets.
This is actually documented. They
I want to have a notable mention
— two million people — was in the
Venezuela has a very interesting
called it "Pacto de Punto Fijo."
here. There was one community,
streets, raising hell and protesting.
history. It’s the birthplace of Simón
"Punto Fijo" means a moving dog
which has a quarter of the population
They were busting windows on
Bolívar. Simón Bolívar is one of the
that stays within a certain space. It
of Caracas living in it. That’s got to
banks. They were really angry and
main figures identified as the liberagoes back and forth. They actually
be 650,000 to a million people living
furious.
tors of five countries in South
called it that! They called themselves
in this "paroquia, " or neighborhood.
Caracas is a city shaped like a
America. Simón Bolívar’s army was
"puntofijistas."
They’re very huge areas organized in
cigar. It’s long and thin. It’s surmade up of mostly African and
They kept the masses and the
the old Spanish way according to
rounded on all sides by mountains
indigenous soldiers, which was difpopular parties out of the picture. So
which church you go to.
and hills. Shanties populate all of
ferent from any other general’s indethey were ready as soon as the dicThis particular paroquia is called
those hills and mountains where the
pendence liberation fighters of the
tatorship was out. They jumped in
"Veintetres Enero," or January 23,
masses of the people live. They live
time. That has made it something
there and assumed power.
named after the date that they
in the shantytowns, right? That’s the
very different and very special to
For forty years, the Adecos and
ejected the old dictator, Andres
great majority of the population of the
Venezuela. That history, that legacy
Copeyanos stole everything that
Pérez Jiménez. This is the most
city. You might have a million people
of struggle continues in Venezuela.
wasn’t nailed to the ground.
combative community. It is probably
living down in Caracas central. Then
Even today the Venezuelan miliVenezuela was one of the most corone of the most combative in the
around the outside you have three
tary is an exceptional military in its
rupt, terrible, sick, openly corrupt
world. It is, without a doubt, the most
million people. Then outside of that,
composition of officers of the working
governments in the entire world. It
combative community in
classes and African and indigenous
was so corrupt that corruption
Caracas. A lot of the people’s
peoples of Venezuela. It’s excepseemed all right because the other
national leadership comes out
tional in that case, and that’s going to
guy was doing so much worse. You
of this neighborhood. There’s a
play an important factor later on
didn’t even have a name for it. They
parallel government that funcwhen I describe current issues in
assumed, "Hey, I won the election,
tions in the neighborhood.
Venezuela. That’s why I raise it.
let’s see how much money I can get,
It is called La Maros, an
Up to 1958, after many struggles,
that’s why I ran." That’s what they
armed revolutionary organizamodern contradictions in Venezuela
would do. They would rip off everytion, that’s originally from
were created around a dictator
thing.
Lumubai, which Sundiestas
named Marcos Pérez Jiménez.
The last President of the Pacto
Lumubai came and pioneered
Jiménez was one of the most terde Fijo was Carlos Andrés Pérez. By
organizing that neighborhood,
rible dictators of South America dur1988 everybody was extremely sick
organized people who had
ing that period of anti-communist dicof the Punto Fijo parties. This guy
already fought for many years.
tatorships throughout Latin America.
actually got elected with quite a bit of
They have a parallel governAs people’s struggles started to rise
support, but that support dwindled
ment. They charge the taxes.
in resistance, and support for dictaimmediately, especially after he
They patrol the streets. The
torships throughout Latin America
came to an agreement with the
police don’t enter Veintetres
started to decline, by 1958 Pérez
International Monetary Fund (IMF)
Enero.
Jiménez had built an oil power within
for austerity measures.
During the rebellions against
Venezuela. Venezuela was already a
The number one austerity meathe austerity measures,
rich country in terms of its oil.
sure, I think was a 15 percent hike in
Veintetres Enero hunkered
On January 23, 1958, Pérez
all basic foodstuffs and services like
down. The community, with
Jiménez was ejected from the counelectricity, gasoline food and everythousands and thousands of
try by a mass uprising of Venezuelan
thing like that went up 15 percent.
people, was entrenched.
Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez sitting
peoples — especially and specifiBut the thing that really upset the
Veintetres Enero is just an
in front of portrait of Simón Bolívar.
cally in Caracas — and a military
people was the 30 percent hike in
amazing place to be. You have
uprising by some of the patriotic milipublic transportation, the Metro.
these giant projects. They’re
tary forces. By that point a pact of
Everything gets around on the Metro.
there are even more poor people.
around twenty stories tall. On the side
official political parties known as the
Everything else was going to take
The rich people live scared as hell
of the buildings they have giant
"Adecos" and the "Copeyanos" came
place within six months to a year, but
looking up at the mountains all the
murals. You can imagine Che, 17
together in a meeting in New York
when he came out and made this
time. They have their apartments
stories tall, standing there overlookCity, in a meeting called the "Punto
speech to the people, the 30 percent
and in the center of Caracas and
ing the city. On another one you have
Fijo." The Adecos are the social
hike in transportation was going to
they’re surrounded on all sides.
Parcero de Ceros. For nearly half a
democrats and the Copeyanos are
start immediately, as soon as he
On this day, the people started
mile, you have murals of all the marthe Christian democrats. They came
ended his speech. So, all the prices
coming down from the mountains.
tyrs, and all the people who have
together to set up what they called
were going to go up right?
They call them "ranchos."They
struggled to build Veintetres Enero;
"alternancia," a thing in South
Pérez turned off the microphone
started coming down from their
people from all over the world.
America identical to the Republican
after he made his speech and he
apartments and they were protestI want to emphasize that the most
and Democrats. It’s two heads of the
went home. The next morning at 5
ing.
significant one is Cumpa Maros.
same horse, eating out of the same
a.m., thousands of Caracanos are
Well, Carlos Andrés Pérez gave
They have youth brigades who paint
trough. There are two parties and
raising hell. The Venezuelansthe order for the military to open fire
the murals. There are only three
they go over the presidential chair or
they’re beautiful people man. They’re
on anything that moved. Now, from
entrances and three exits to the
they trade the presidential chair off
just expressing raising hell. They are
what I understand, up to half the men
paroquia. That’s also strategic for the
between each other. The same thing
chanting "rahayo, rahayo," and it
refused and didn’t leave the barState. But when you enter, there’s
happens in this country. But, the
looks like they’re fighting, but they’re
racks. The other half that was loyal to
this huge mural. It’s got the face of a
just kicking back talking, right?
same people keep the power.
Carlos Andrés Pérez, went into the
Cumpa Maro woman. She’s wearing
May 2003
a mask. Across the top of the mural it
says, "Veintetres Enero, bienvenidos
entienen en paz, pero si vienen en
guerra comparteneros." Now let me
translate that to you. It means,
"January Twenty-three, if you come
in peace you are welcome, but if you
come in war we will fight you." That’s
the first thing you see if you go into
the neighborhood.
When we arrived there, I just
thought, ‘Wow!’ I have to emphasize
to you again that Veintetres Enero is
an African/Indigenous neighborhood.
The Uhuru Movement has got to go
see Veintetres Enero.
So in Veintetres Enero there was
a caracaso, a massacre. They call it
caracaso. In Veintetres Enero, the
military, the national guard — forget
about the police, the police don’t
even try to get in there — tried to get
into Veintetres Enero. From the
roques, they rained down not just a
hail of armor piercing bullets against
not just all the military equipment, but
also beds, chairs and tables.
We were talking to people who
were there and they remember. The
soldiers were patrolling the streets
and they would have a flowerpot hit
them on the head and a lady would
laugh — the people were dropping
stuff on them.
They would run out of there with
their tails between their legs.
Veintetres Enero stood firm against
the state repression.
There are mountainous parts. The
"mastresto" starts right next to
Palace Unida, the government
palace.The mountain range is very
tall. They officially changed the name
in Venezuela of these mountains to
the Sierra Maestra in honor of the
mountain rangers, Fidel Castro and
Che, who led the revolution to take
over Havana, the Cuban revolution.
In Venezuela, they named the mountains in honor of them. In fact, when
Fidel goes to Caracas, if I’m not mistaken, that’s where he spends the
night. He doesn’t go to the hotels
because that’s a big risk. So, he
goes where he is most secure.
After that the whole situation in
Venezuela changed, Carlos Andrés
Pérez was the most heinous and
hated man in Venezuela. There were
clamors, rumors and struggles in the
streets everyday. There were rumors
of the coup being planned. A conspiracy was born. It had already existed
for numerous years, but only in
words. But it actually started to be
planned out in 1989 into 1990. This
was called the MBR 2000. It was the
Movimiento
Boliviano
de
Revolucionario, the Bolivian
Revolutionary Movement.
It started happening among the
patriotic sectors of the military. The
masses of people already were organized, especially in Veintetres Enero.
Within the military, they officially say
up to 30 percent of some of the highranking officials, but mostly middle
and lower military soldiers and officials, organized into this conspiracy
to overthrow Carlos Andrés Pérez.
This is significant.
By 1981, the conspiracy had
spread throughout all the sectors,
including the civil organizations and
popular organizations (including
Veintetres Enero.)Other urban and
rural guerilla groups also joined this
conspiracy called Movimiento
Boliviariano. It had the unity of all the
THE BURNING SPEAR
IN
25
LATIN AMERICA
people’s organization, including this
speech! "For now!" Then the TV
Bolivarian sector of the military.
went off, or the interview went off and
This real shady, secretive person
the statement went off. He made the
was organizing it all. Nobody knew
speech. He called for his forces to
his name. People considered his
put their arms down. Then he said
name as "Raphael," others as
"but, for now." That’s how he ended
"Juan." They had invented all sorts of
his speech! Super-important!
names. Nobody knew who he was,
He was put in prison. The next
but people who met with him were
morning, the walls throughout the
trying to figure it out and started to
city of Caracas were covered with
put a face to this.
graffiti: "For Now," "For Now," "For
By February 1992, the
Now," "For Now," "For Now," "Por
Movimiento Boliviariano gave them
Ahora," "Por Ahora," "Por Ahora".
the password. I think it was someThis is true! I’m telling you. This
thing like "It is now 11:00am." Phone
really happened.
calls went around to all the leaderWhile Chávez was in prison, tens
ship throughout Caracas and the
of thousands of people would surcountry, to military bases that had
round the prison and try to visit him.
been part of this conspiracy, and they
They would surround the prison and
rose up in a coup d’etat against
chant in support of him. It was a
Carlos Andrés Pérez.
beautiful process. He became a
It was not a traditional coup d’etat.
national figure. He continued to
This was a coup d’etat, which had
organize and agitate while he was in
the backing of popular organizations.
prison.
Not only did it have the backing of
He was released two years later
popular organizations, but also once
in 1994. He was forced to leave the
the people had realized that the coup
country for a short while due to
was here, the people came out into
assassination threats and attempts.
the streets and said, "Yes! Let’s get
He returned to Venezuela in 1996
rid of this sucker!" They called him
and started to mobilize something
"El Gocho." "We’re gonna take his
called the "Movimiento Quinta
him. He actually decided to turn himhead!"
República," the Movement of the
self in after a few days when the
They surrounded the presidential
Fifth Republic. This was a new politifighting was still going on in the
palace. Everybody was ready to get
cal party.
streets of Caracas and throughout
down and support what they called,
The way the Venezuelans conthe country.
and still call "el Aliancia Civico Mita,"
sider their history, is that they conHe turned himself in on a condithe Civic-Military Alliance.
sider that there have been four
tion.
He said to the government — to
Sad to say, the conspiracy that
republics: going back to the time of
Carlos Andrés Pérez — "I will turn
the military had planned failed. Very
Simón Bolívar and the founding of
myself in only if you allow me space
important sectors of the military got
Venezuela and the wars of indepenon the national television station, and
cold feet. When Carlos Andrés Pérez
dence up until the elections. So,
on that space, when I get that time to
called them in to attack, they didn’t
Chávez was calling for the formation
speak directly to the Venezuelan
attack. At the same time they didn’t
of a new republic, the Quinta
people, I’m going to be wearing my
offer to come in with their support for
República.
military uniform and my red beret
the Bolivarians. Those Bolivarian milHe formed this party and won the
and all my rights, all my insignias.
itary officials that didn’t come out to
election by a landslide. The people
Under any other condition, I’m not
support this coup had turned over
supported him. From that point forgoing to turn myself in. In fact, you’re
arms to the people. I want to emphaward, things started to move very
going to have to kill me."
size this. Those arms were never
rapidly.
Carlos Andrés Pérez understood
returned!
He won the presidency.
how weak his position was, espeNow when the coup had been put
Immediately, the new government
cially within his military. Fearing furdown, and everyone knew that it
called for a national constituency to
ther outbreak, he decided to support
happened, the leader of the coup
rewrite the constitution of Venezuela.
this idea. He put Chávez on televipresented himself. It was Hugo
There’s a 90 percent approval rating
sion. They only give him fifteen minChávez Frias. Teniente Coronel
on the rewriting of the constitution.
utes on national TV. Chávez made a
Hugo Chávez Frias, who was a
They formed a national con speech expressing and explaining
Lieutenant Colonel. He was a parastituency. Of the 130 delegates to the
the goals of the Bolivarian process,
trooper and the symbol of a paraconstituency to rewrite the constituthe Bolivarian Revolution, using the
trooper was a red beret.
tion, 128 are Chavistas. They call the
language of the people. He said,
He came out and said "I take
Bolivarians "Chavistas" now. One
"Compañeras y compañeros, we
responsibility for the coup. Stop your
delegate is an Adeco and another is
have failed. The attempt to overthrow
shooting, stop your killing." I believe
a Copeyano.
this corrupt dictatorship has not
400 people were killed in the
They rewrote the constitution. It
occurred. The Puntofijistas, the
Bolivarian attempt to overthrow
calls for another presidential elecAdecos and the Copeyanos, remain
Carlos Andrés Pérez., Chávez came
tion. This time, Chávez won by
in power – for now!"
out and said, "You know what? I did
another extra 10 percent. The secThat was how he ended his
it."
Some of
t
h
e
Bolivarians
were still
fighting.
The fighting
was still
going on
a f t e r
Chávez
turned himself in. He
had actu ally gone ¡LA VERDAD! is published by Unión del Barrio as a means by which to provide political
into hiding education/information to its membership, supporters, and other movement activists.
for several ¡LA VERDAD! is presently the most widely read completely independent Chicano Mexicano
days
in
Veintetres liberation publication and is circulated throughout occupied México/Atzlán from San Diego
Enero. The to San Antonio, Texas. For more information on how to get ¡LA VERDAD! contact:
Veintetres
Enero was
La Verdad Publicatiions · P.O. Box 620095 · San Diego, Califas 92162
guarding
uniondelbarrio.org · [email protected] · 619/696-9224
[The Chavistas]
have the
government, but
not the State. You
have to understand
the difference. The
difference is the
institutions: the
Supreme Court, the
police, all of the
things that define
what the
government is. It’s
actual physical
presence is in the
hands of the old
republic.
26
ond election was in the second year
of his presidency.
With that second election and the
new constitution, they called for new
elections at every level of government — down to the community
level, to the municipal level, to the
state level and to the national level in
the national assembly.
In all of those elections, the
Chavistas got 98 percent of all the
public official seats throughout the
country! Two percent remained in the
old parties. 98 percent were
Chavistas!
They swept away, completely
annihilated, the old punto fijo parties.
Those parties ceased to exist. In
fact, if you say on the streets of
Caracas today that you’re a
Copeyano or an Adeco, they’ll throw
rocks at you! They’ll get you with
sticks. They can’t even show their
faces.
So now the entire government is
in the hands of the Bolivarians. They
call it "the Process." Some people
call it the revolution, but most people
who are more aware, call it the
Bolivarian Process.
And Bolivarianism swept the elections. It swept Venezuela, and the
people are out in the streets. They
say "through Chávez the people
speak." This is what the slogan is.
Now, I want to emphasize a few
things very briefly. The ruling class
obviously didn’t sit on its hands
through this whole time, especially
when they realized they weren’t
going to be able to control Chávez.
They immediately started to agitate.
But, they didn’t have the political parties anymore, and they didn’t have
the government, but they still had the
State.
The Chavistas – the Bolivarians –
don’t have the State of Venezuela.
They have the government, but not
the State. You have to understand
the difference.
The difference is the institutions:
the Supreme Court, the police, all of
the things that define what the government is. It’s actual physical presence is in the hands of the old republic. The new republic – the
Bolivarians, the Chavistas – they just
have the government. They have the
posts. So, there’s this ongoing battle,
right?
THE BURNING SPEAR
IN
LATIN AMERICA
May 2003
opposition parties. In fact, the media,
hatred towards Chávez, and the only
During that time, Caracas stops.
through the newspaper and the telething they’re doing is directing or
Everybody’s watching. Even the peovision, on a daily basis attacked the
attracting more hatred — class
ple who hate Chávez watch. They
government. They called for a coup
hatred or national hatred — against
ask, "What’s this psycho saying
d’etat, called for the assassination of
themselves. So it’s an amazing
today?" This is "Aló Presidente".
Chávez and, in fact, they go even
dynamic that’s going on there.
We missed out. We had an invitafurther.
I mean, I don’t
know if there’s
anything worse
than calling for
assassination,
but check this
out. They’re so
sick – you have to
understand that
the ruling class of
Venezuela is one
of the most corrupt, reactionary,
racist, non-culruling
tured
classes in all of
Latin America.
They haven’t got
any kind of culture. They spend
half their time in
Miami and the
other half in
Caracas. They
don’t know what
The African and indigenous peoples of Venezuela have held massive demonstrations in opposition
Venezuela is.
to the anti-Chávez demonstrations organized by the ruling class. 80 percent of the population
These people,
support Chávez.
who have grown
accustomed to ripping off everything
tion to go and meet Chávez and
that wasn’t nailed down – especially
attend a session on "Aló
the oil money, were making so much
Presidente." Because there were
money they got super-angry.
problems in our time schedule, we
I want to emphasize this. Chávez
weren’t able to attend.
is an African-indigenous president. If
I believe 30 percent of the counyou look at him, he’s almost the pertry has already been organized,
fect mixture of an African-indigenous
either into community assemblies –
man. The reactionaries, the ruling
with whatever names and whatever
class hate him so much that on a
principles of unity they might form –
daily basis the newspapers and the
or into "Circulos Bolivarianos," fortelevision call him "the savage." They
mations that are promoted by the
call him "the monkey." They call him
government to support the
the most vicious, terrible things.
Bolivarian Process, or the revoluCheck out how it works. 80 pertionary process as you might call it. It
cent of the people of Venezuela supis revolutionary in the context of
port Chávez. 50 percent are African
Venezuela. We have to recognize
and 45 percent are indigenous. So
that.
when the ruling class calls him a
These assemblies are local levels
"monkey" and a "savage," the rest of
of government. You can get together
the people take it as the ruling class
from eight to 100 people, I believe in
calling them that. They know that an
an assembly. You have official
attack against Chávez is an attack
recognition as either an assembly or
against all of them. The hatred that
a "Circulos Bolivarianos." There are
had already existed for so many gencertain principles of unity. They are
erations gets even more concenpolitical in character, but they are
mostly communitarian in practice.
Those things are from organizing
for community patrols and around
food, shelter and clothing – the basic
needs of the community. They’re
also political in character. They
involve political education. They call
The only way that Chávez has to
it participatory democracy. Once they
speak directly to the people is a
get recognition by the government,
Sunday show going on right now at
they get government funding and are
this minute. It’s called "Aló
supported by the government instituPresidente." On "Aló Presidente," he
tions.
comes out and speaks for about
When we were there, I went to at
three hours about anything. He
least 30 meetings, several in a day. I
makes references to government
was there for a month. So, I went to
policy and the direction of the
at least 30 meetings of these assemBolivarian Process. He also talks
blies, and they were very beautiful
about his childhood growing up. He
and very mass-based in character.
goes on about suffering racism and
I went to one that was an assemhis experiences as a cadet. He talks
bly of assemblies. There were
about the world situation. He makes
around 700 people from different
Chávez in a meeting with Brazilian president Ignacio “Lula” de Silva
fun of Bush or he speaks against the
areas. It was in the heart of
war in Afghanistan. Really what you
Veintetres Enero, the combative
Well, the ruling class immediately
trated and it comes to even more of
have is an informal weekly political
neighborhood I told you about.
mobilized itself. Their main tool is the
a head. You understand what I’m
education session every Sunday.
Another thing that’s very impormedia. The media — the newspasaying?
The show is supposed to start at
tant is the new constitution. There is
pers, television stations, and the
So, this whole time the ruling
noon, but usually it starts at 12:45 or
cultural and political representation
radio stations — assumed the role of
class is trying to agitate some kind of
later and it goes to 5:00 or 6:00pm.
to the oppressed masses through
80 percent of the
people of Venezuela
support Chávez. 50
percent are African
and 45 percent are
indigenous. So
when the ruling
class calls him a
"monkey" and a
"savage," the rest
of the people take
it as the ruling
class calling them
that. They know
that an attack
against Chávez is
an attack against
all of them.
May 2003
this participatory democracy. Also,
every oppressed sector of the population is guaranteed a certain consistent representation within the
national assembly. The indigenous
sector and the different paroquias
have consistent representation
within the national assembly. That’s
something that hadn’t occurred
before. It’s written in the new constitution.
Since the time that Chávez came
in, 500,000 housing units have been
built. The budget for education has
multiplied by 600 percent. One million new students have been enrolled
into Escuelas Bolivarianas,
Bolivarian Schools. In these schools,
they feed the children at least one
meal a day and sometimes up to
three meals a day.
There’s a health campaign within
the schools. The schools have many
different functions. There’s over one
thousand Bolivarian Schools and
thousands of old schools have been
repaired. Again, that’s a 600 percent
increase in the budget for education.
In the national campaigns for
health, one million children have
been vaccinated. Old medical associations have been torn apart.
They’ve built up new medical associations with the most progressive sectors of the medical industry. They’ve
sent them out to the countryside.
This health campaign has reduced
the infant mortality rate by 20 percent
over the last four years.
Those are some of the basic victories and gains of "el Proceso
Bolivariano" or "la Revolucíon
Bolivariana." It was a beautiful, beautiful experience to visit Venezuela.
The people there are just so beautiful and wonderful. They’re developing a new level of consciousness, a
new culture of struggle. I’ve never
seen anything like that in my life! I tell
you there’s no going back for
Venezuela. Venezuela is forever
transformed!
It’s not just the beauty of the
transformation of society there. They
have the most beautiful beaches. We
went down to this beautiful little fishing town called Choní. It’s an African
town. It’s just the most amazing, with
the most incredible beaches and the
most incredible dynamics. So, we
also got to enjoy ourselves in that
sense.
I really highly recommend any of
you to travel if you ever get the
opportunity. However, it is also a
dangerous place to be. I actually forgot to mention the April 11, 2002
coup d’etat. This is a fundamental
issue and I forgot to mention this.
On April 7, 2002, the bourgeoisie
— the oligarchy — had done so
much agitation and had raised so
much anti-Chávez fear, especially in
saying that Chávez is going to turn
Venezuela into a Castro-communist
State because he was friends with
Fidel Castro. They were organizing
larger and larger protests. These
were significantly attended by the
people of Venezuela. At the biggest
one, they had about 500,000 people
marching against the government.
In one of the editions of Aló
Presidente, the President’s show, he
called the opposition "escualidos,"
which means squalid — very thin
and emaciated. He meant that politically and physically.
They had marches up to 500,000
THE BURNING SPEAR
people. In the next few days, ten
times as many Chavistas, or
Bolivarians, marched against that
previous march. So there had been a
war of marches going on for many
months, and this culminated on April
11, 2002.
On April 11, both sides were
IN
LATIN AMERICA
In fact, 11 Chavistas were murdered that day, assassinated that
day, shot down that day. One of the
opposition people was shot. That
person was shot because he was too
damn close to the Chavista march.
They dragged his body back to
where the other marchers were.
Above: Venezuelan soldiers, loyal to Chávez, take position to push back
the CIA induced military coup. Below: The people take to the streets
in opposition to the military coup.
[One of the loyal
Air Force
commanders] told
the coup plotters,
"either you bring
Chávez back alive
within hours, or
we’re going to
scramble our F-14s
and we’re going to
bomb you and the
Presidential Palace,
and you all can die."
scheduled to march. When they
arrived about three blocks from the
Presidential Palace, one march on
top of the bridge and the other down
underneath on one of the main
streets of Caracas, bullets started to
rain down from sharp shooters from
four different buildings. The bullets
were raining down against the
Chavistas, against the Bolivarians.
Now, the military came out and
the international press came out and
said that the government had
opened fire against the opposition,
against the escualidos, against the
people who hate Chávez. That was
what was spread around the world.
They caught the sharp shooters.
They included a Panamanian and
two Salvadorians. People were saying that the CIA had trained the
sharp shooters. That was common
knowledge.
Using that terrible thing that had
occurred in the center of Caracas, a
small group of military officials who
had conspired to rise up entered the
palace. Some of them being very
close to Chávez arrested him,
putting him on a helicopter. They
took him out to an island.
By that evening, the loyal military
forces of Chávez opened up the
forts. They had gone out to the
streets and started spreading out
weapons into the streets. They surrounded the palace. They say at
least one million people came down
again into the streets. This was just
last year on April 11, 2002.
At least one million people surrounded the palace. Some people
say that it was up to four million people. I don’t know how that’s possible.
There are only four million people in
Caracas, but they say people came
around from outside of Caracas, too.
They surrounded the Presidential
Palace, while the conspirators were
holed up inside the palace. This is all
on video. The conspirators were
looking out the window and they
knew that the people were going to
take their heads.
The lynchpin was that the loyal
sector of the Venezuelan Air Force
gave a phone call to Palacio
Miraflores, one of the Air Force com-
27
manders. He told the coup plotters,
"either you bring Chávez back alive
within hours, or we’re going to
scramble our F-14s and we’re going
to bomb you and the Presidential
Palace, and you all can die."
They were already surrounded
from the outside and now they were
risking being bombed from above.
So they got together, packed up their
stuff, got into their cars, went out and
escaped through a tunnel underneath that comes out a block away at
another government building. Then
you could see the cars coming out in
a caravan and getting out of there!
At around 4:00 a.m. a helicopter
came in with Chávez. On the video,
you see the masses of people are in
the streets. The helicopter flew in
low, and everybody was yelling
"Yeah!" because they knew Chávez
was coming back!
They landed him on the lawn of
the Presidential Palace, which is the
center of Caracas. He came out and
all hell broke loose in the city!
Chávez was back.
He came out and addressed the
population, obviously having been
tortured. His face was very swollen.
He had on overalls, covering his
body, and he reassumed control of
Venezuela.
Recently, there was another "general strike." It was a takeover. The
escualidos are very desperate, and
they held Panavesa, the national oil
industry, hostage. They wouldn’t
release any of the oil.
That’s one of the reasons that gas
prices are so high right now. It’s
because they shut down all the oil
processing plants. They shut down
all the tankers. But Chávez, with the
support of Lula, broke the strike. Lula
sent technicians to get the machines
running and Brazilian tankers to
transport the oil.
Now Chávez has regained control
— the people have regained control
of Venezuela’s natural resources.
This brings you up to date on
what’s occurring. Before they left, the
escualidos destroyed all the technical equipment within Panavesa.
That’s why the oil hasn’t reached the
same capacity that it had before the
strike.That’s one of the reasons. I
shouldn’t say it’s the reason why gas
prices have gone up. That’s one of
the reasons. That’s an excuse to
gouge the prices by oil companies.
So, in a long presentation, that’s
what’s happening in Venezuela.
Unión del Barrio is a Mexican Liberation
Organization whose struggles for selfdetermination and the return of the land
stolen from Mexico by the U.S. in 1848 is
a continuation of the Chicano Power
Movement of the 1960s and `70s.
Founded in 1981 in San Diego, California,
Unión del Barrio’s fight in the interests of
the working class Raza people has been
informed by the necessity of the reunification of México under a socialist economic and social system for there to be
national liberation for the Raza people.
For more information on Unión del Barrio
write to P.O. Box 620095, San Diego,
Califas 92162 or email: [email protected]
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Bush’s plans for war against the nonwhite world and the expected attack
on Civil Liberties. $10.
2) The Value of Stolen Black
Labor. Speech by Omali Yeshitela
presented on Labor Day Weekend,
2002 at the Uhuru House in St.
Petersburg, Florida. Discusses the
critical role of the slave trade and the
continuing exploitation of African
labor in the development and
maintenance of world capitalism.
Argues the demand for reparations.
$10.
3) African Heroes and Martyrs.
Speech by Omali Yeshitela in 1995
at Li’l Bobby Hutton Park in Oakland,
California. Recounts the
development of the Black Power
Movement of the ‘60s, the U.S.
counterinsurgency war that defeated
it and today’s work to rebuild.
$10.
4) The Battle of St. Petersburg.
Includes footage from the rebellions,
demonstrations, tribunal and vigils
through which the African working
class community of St. Petersburg
rose up and forced the city to listen,
following the police 1996 murder of
TyRon Lewis. $10.
How to Order:
You can order from Burning
Spear Publications in 2 ways:
1) Fill out this form and mail in.
Make check payable to:
Burning Spear Publications
Mail to:
Burning Spear Publications
P.O. Box 11281
St. Petersburg, FL 33733-1281
2) Order online at
www.burningspearuhuru.com
Allow 2-3 weeks for delivery
This Time ‘Til It’s
Won...Power In Our Own
Hands by Omali Yeshitela. This
Political Report to the 2nd Party
Congress of the African People’s
Socialist Party (APSP) in 1987
features an overview of Yeshitelism,
an introduction to the development
of the APSP and an analysis of the
state and future of the struggle for
black freedom. 104 pgs. $4.
Audio Tapes
Izwe Lethu i Afrika! (Africa is
Our Land) by Omali Yeshitela. This
political report to the 3rd Party
Congress of the African People’s
Socialist Party in 1990 sums up the
current period as the “Era of Worldwide
African Revolution and Socialist
Unification of Africa and African People
Under the Leadership of the African
Working Class and Poor Peasants.”
122 pgs. $10.
The Dialectics of Black
Revolution; The Struggle to
Defeat the Counterinsurgency
in the U.S. by Omali Yeshitela. A
description of the forces that gave rise to
the Black Power Movement of the ‘60s,
the U.S. government military program
that defeated it, and a strategy for
African liberation. 39 pgs. $6.
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Discusses Current Events with
Local and International Leaders on the Front Lines of Struggle
Mohammed Aldouri, Iraqi Ambassador to the United Nations on the U.S. war against
Iraq.
Zhang Yuan Yuan, Chinese Embassy representative on the downing and holding of the
U.S. spy plane in China. Also discusses Chinese-African solidarity.
Abu Layla, Political Bureau member of the Democratic Front for the Liberation of
Palestine, direct from Ramulah on the morning following the DFLP’s carrying out of the first
Palestinian armed action penetrating an Israeli military post in the Occupied Territories.
Thami Daliwonga Ka Plaatjie Secretary General of the Pan Africanist Congress of
Azania (South Africa) on the continuing struggle for land and black power in Africa.
Minister Curtis Gatewood, President of the Durham, North Carolina branch of the NAACP speaks
against Bush’s war and his struggle to move the National NAACP and the country’s religious leaders to an
anti-war position.
Deadria Farmer-Paelmann, on her reparations research and lawsuits.
Lawrence Hamm, President of People Organized for Progess on their work to stop police
brutality in New Jersey.
NYC Councilman Charles Barron, shares his views on black power and economic development.
Paul Renne, San Francisco attorney who argued against HUD’s “1 Strike You’re Out” rule before the U.S.
Supreme Court and Robles Park Residents Council President Connie Burton on the rights of public
housing residents.
Also available on audio tape ...
1)The Value of Stolen Black Labor. 2)Sharpeville Commemoration/The Vanguard Party.
Item
Cost per item
Quantity
Cost
Book - Why I Became a Revolutionary
$5.00
Book - This Time Til It’s Won
$4.00
Book - Overturning the Culture of Violence
$22.95
Book - Dialectics of Black Revolution
$6.00
Book - Izwe Lethu i Afrika!
$10.00
Video $10.00
Video $10.00
Audio $5.00
Audio $5.00
Add $4. shipping cost for orders under $25.
Total enclosed _______
Phone __________________________
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Address______________________________________
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