Chokwe Lumumba was an exemplary leader for Black liberation in the U.S., particularly in the U.S. South. As a founding member of the Provisional Government of the Republic of New Afrika and the Malcolm X Grassroots Movement, he dedicated his life to the African American liberation struggle and the belief that African Americans in the U.S. have a right to self-determination. As an attorney, he represented many African American political prisoners and people facing state repression, including Assata Shakur and hip-hop artist Tupac Shakur.

On June 5, 2013, Chokwe Lumumba was elected mayor of Jackson, winning 87% of the vote in the general election. His term as mayor was cut short by his sudden death. Chokwe Lumumba will be missed for his revolutionary legacy that taught people all over the world that the struggle for Black liberation in the Black Belt South continues boldly in the 21st century.

Chokwe Lumumba’s passing is felt by working and oppressed people far and wide. The struggle to which he dedicated his life continues.

With regards, The Freedom Road Socialist Organization

#JacksonMS #Remembrances #selfdetermination #nationalLiberation #FreedomRoadSocialistOrganization #ChokweLumumba #MalcolmXGrassrootsMovement #NewAfrika #Elections

Chinese Defense Ministry spokesman Yang Yujun states that China created the Identification Zone with “the aim of safeguarding state sovereignty, territorial land and air security and maintaining flight order. This is a necessary measure taken by China in exercising its self-defense right.”

Inside the newly created Identification Zone are the Japan-occupied Diaoyu Islands. Historically a part of China, Japan maintains physical control over the Diaoyu Islands and the islands have become a flashpoint in Chinese-Japanese relations in recent years.

Japan’s current Prime Minister, Shinzo Abe – a right winger who defends Japan’s brutal imperial past – is up in arms about the decision to establish the Identification Zone.

A Nov. 24 report in The Guardian states, “Japan has denounced the zone set up by China on Saturday as ‘totally unacceptable’ and indicated that aircraft from its self-defence force would ignore Beijing's attempt to oblige aeroplanes to obtain its permission before entering.”

On Nov. 23 U.S Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel stated, “This announcement by the People's Republic of China will not in any way change how the U.S. conducts military operations in the region.”

Referring to the Diaoyu Islands as the ‘Senkaku Islands’, which is the name used by the Japanese authorities, Hegel affirmed the U.S. was ready to join a military conflict with China, stating, “We remain steadfast in our commitments to our allies and partners. The U.S. reaffirms its longstanding policy that Article V of the U.S.-Japan Mutual Defense Treaty applies to the Senkaku Islands.”

#MinneapolisMN #China #selfdetermination #Japan #USImperialism #DiaoyuIslands #EastChinaSeaAirDefenseIdentificationZone #Asia

The South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control (DHEC) has been criticized for its slow response to an outbreak of tuberculosis (TB) which has infected more than 100 people in rural Greenwood County, South Carolina since last March. More than 400 children at Ninety Six Primary School in Greenwood County were not tested for almost three months after TB was first reported.

Greenwood County is part of the Black Belt, named for the rich soil farmed by slave labor, which forms the heart of the African American Nation in the South. The national oppression that Black people face is most intense in the Black Belt South, even greater than other areas of the South. The poverty rate for Blacks, already much higher than that of whites, is even higher for Blacks in the African American Nation than other Blacks in the South. The infant mortality rate is also higher and the life span lower for Blacks in the African American Nation than Blacks living outside the nation but in the South.

The mishandling of the TB outbreak by the South Carolina DHEC is another example of the poor-quality government services and health care that are part of the all round economic, political, cultural and social oppression that African Americans face in the U.S.

I want to comment on two mistaken views in the left about national oppression. One incorrect view reduces national oppression to just a matter of racist attitudes among whites in general and white workers in particular. According to this view, if we can just overcome these racist ideas, then African Americans and whites can “unite and fight.” The problem is that there are important material differences in the lives of whites and African Americans, not just bad ideas. For example, African Americans are almost twice as likely as whites not to have any health insurance (19.5% vs. 11.1%). This is in part because many more whites (61.6%) than African Americans (44.6%) have jobs that provide health insurance benefits. White workers need to be won over to supporting demands for equality for African Americans, such as universal government health care, which would especially help African Americans, and also Chicanos, Mexicanos and Latinos, whose lack of health insurance is even higher than that of African Americans (at 30.1%) .

There is also a view that whites in general and white workers in particular actually benefit from the national oppression of African Americans. If this were true, we would expect to see a pattern where the more intense the national oppression is, the better off whites should be. But in fact whites in the Black Belt South where the African American Nation is based are worse off than other southern whites outside the Black Belt. An example of this is that the life span of whites is shorter, and the infant mortality rate among whites higher, in the Black Belt South than in other areas of the South.

This should be no surprise, for when the government doesn’t take care of public health, the tuberculosis bacteria doesn’t care if the body they are infecting is African American or white. So fighting national oppression is in the interest of white workers, because they face a common enemy: the wealthiest 1%, or the monopoly capitalists, who own and control the giant corporations that dominate the economy and control the government. But to upend the power of the 1%, we need an alliance between the working class and the national movements (the movements of oppressed nationalities such as African Americans, Arab and Asian Americans, Chicanos, Mexicanos, and Latinos, and Native Americans and Pacific Islanders). This alliance can only be forged by explaining to white workers that fighting national oppression is in their own interests and that they need to support the struggle for equality by Black people and support the right of self-determination, up to and including secession, for the African American nation.

#SouthCarolina #SC #healthCare #AntiRacism #selfdetermination #BlackBeltSouth

In a day of action organized by Students for a Democratic Society, October 7 saw dozens of protests across the country against the Afghanistan war on the 8th anniversary of the U.S. invasion. Students marched, conducted die-ins and skits, and some were arrested as they demanded money be spent at home on education and healthcare, instead of two wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Students Take Action

Hundreds of students marched in Washington, DC in a “Funk the War” event organized by DC Students for a Democratic Society. The demonstrators stormed the lobby of a building that houses Chevron, Shell, Blackwater’s lobbying group, United Technologies, and Clear Channel, demanding U.S. troops out of Afghanistan and Iraq.

In Gainesville, Florida, 40 people rallied in the Plaza of the Americas at the University of Florida to protest the war in Afghanistan. The protesters then marched to Turlington, chanting “Fund education, not occupation” and “What do we want? Peace! When do we want it? Now!” The demonstrators held a “die-in” during a class change to symbolically represent innocents killed in war. Protester Fernando Figueroa said, “I think the demonstrations in both Gainesville and across the United States showed that students are willing to fight back against imperialism and demand that funding be used for education and not occupation…what we have done today doesn't end here. We will keep building the movement to end the U.S. occupation of Afghanistan.”

In Asheville, North Carolina students shouted “Money for jobs and education, not for war and occupation!” across the quad on the University of North Carolina at Asheville. UNCA Students for a Democratic Society member Angela Denio said, “The people of Afghanistan have the right to self determination. Eight years of unjust U.S. occupation in Afghanistan has resulted in hundreds of civilian casualties, and displaced too many families that are now living in extreme suffering and poverty.” The SDS chapter in Chapel Hill, NC also had 30 people protesting the war, with hundreds more stopping to listen to speeches.

A “Funk the War” protest by Rochester SDS that drew dozens into the streets demanding an end to the occupations and an end to militarization of schools ended violently, when almost 30 police cars interrupted the peaceful protest and began shoving students and community members, threatening them with batons, and spraying them with pepper spray. The police arrested 12 protestors, 2 of whom had to go to the hospital for injuries caused by police brutality. The first person arrested by the police was the only African-American student in the vicinity, and protestors quickly called the police out on this obvious racism. This protest was part of a larger campaign by Rochester SDS to end budget cuts and demilitarize their schools.

University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee SDS had a protest of 50 people including members of Iraq Veterans Against the War. The protest led to SDSers starting a new campaign for education rights and to fight cutbacks on their campus, as well as a campaign against a racist student senator.

University of Houston SDS held a teach-in with 70 people in attendance. Afghanistan war veteran Matt Dobbs spoke about his experiences in two tours of duty in Afghanistan, and how he has come to oppose the war on a civilian population that is fighting a battle of self-defense against the U.S. occupation.

University of Minnesota SDS held a protest of 30 students that included a skit to demonstrate the need for funding to go to education and not the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Grace Kelley of SDS linked the war to sexism at home, saying “It has been argued by many people, politicians, and even feminists, that the war in Afghanistan is in fact going to liberate the women of Afghanistan. This argument reveals a prejudiced belief that we Americans are in a culturally superior position to help, which is both bigoted and untrue. How can our military forces help the women in Afghanistan overcome their own cultural oppressions when we can’t even eliminate sexism within the military itself, with one in three female veterans reporting sexual assault while in service? How can we claim that we are creating a better world for Afghan women when our superior military force continues to widow them and maim their children? How can we say we are helping the people of Afghanistan when our bombs murder Afghan civilians everyday?”

An Unjust War

The war in Afghanistan is becoming more and more deadly as it continues. 311 coalition troops were killed in the war in 2009 alone, bringing the total of dead soldiers to 869. U.S. and NATO occupation forces do not keep track of civilian casualties, but many estimate that U.S. air strikes and gunfire have killed tens of thousands of Afghans. Just last month, U.S. air strikes killed over 90 Afghan civilians in the northern Afghan village of Omar Kheil. A similar strike in Farah province on May 4 this year killed 147 civilians.

Troop levels have increased from 5,200 in 2002 to 68,000 in 2009, with no talk of de-escalation or ending the war. The war is costing American taxpayers millions of dollars everyday – $228 billion overall, $60.2 billion of which was spent in 2009 alone.

There will be no justice for the Afghan people while U.S. and NATO forces occupy their country. Only full U.S. and NATO withdraw will give the Afghan people self-determination, their right. It is the continued responsibility of activists in the US to demand an end to the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan, and to insist that the hundreds billions of dollars being used to pay off the banks and wage war on peoples around the world be used for social needs at home, like education and healthcare.

#UnitedStates #AntiwarMovement #StudentMovement #Occupation #StudentsForADemocraticSociety #Afghanistan #selfdetermination

The civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s was more than a fight for civil rights; it was a Black liberation movement. It was a struggle of the African American people for full equality. For 75 years, Jim Crow, the system of legal segregation backed by the death squads of the Ku Klux Klan in the South and the systematic discrimination in housing, education and employment in the North and West denied African Americans equality with whites.

Today, the mass mobilization of Mexicanos, Chicanos and other Latinos shows the grassroots desire for full equality in the face of discriminatory immigration laws and practices. A key demand is legalization of the undocumented, which will help them to challenge exploitation and racism and aid in the reunification of their families. The Bush administration’s call for a ‘guest worker program’ to aid business would be a step in the wrong direction, as it would establish a group of second-class residents whose only right would be to work for low pay.

The Black liberation movement was also a struggle for self-determination. It is no accident that the movement began in the U.S. South, from the Montgomery, Alabama bus boycott to the sit-in at Woolworth’s in Greensboro, North Carolina, for this is the home of the African American Nation. The African American Nation developed as slavery forged different African peoples with their own languages, cultures and religions into a single people with a common territory, economy, language and culture. After the end of the Civil War and slavery, the United States kept this new nation in chains through Jim Crow and the lynch mob. The Black liberation movement, by breaking the chains of segregation and the Klan, was a step toward both full equality for the African American people in the North and South and towards self-determination for the African American Nation.

Mexicans in the U.S. Southwest have also been forged into a Chicano Nation, as the thousands of Mexicans who lived on land annexed by the United States in 1848 have grown into millions due to immigration from Mexico, under conditions of legal segregation, economic exploitation, systematic suppression of their language and culture and theft of their land. Just as African Americans were denied their human rights through Jim Crow, so today are Chicanos, Mexicanos and other Latinos denied their human rights through unjust immigration laws. These laws are chains on the Chicano Nation, not only affecting millions of undocumented, but millions more of their family members who are legal residents or U.S. citizens.

This wave of anti-immigrant legislation in the works at the national, state and local levels, and the rise of new white vigilantes such as the Minutemen, is not just a tactic to try to build support for the right, the Republicans and the Bush administration, who are suffering from their debacles in Iraq, New Orleans and the attempted privatization of Social Security. Just as the right is trying to reduce the Black population of New Orleans – one of the most important cities economically and culturally of the African American Nation – so too would the anti-immigrant movement try to reduce the Mexicano and Latino population. This is a direct attack on the Chicano Nation, which is gaining strength as Mexicanos and their children who settle in the Southwest become a part of the nation.

The African American movement of the 1950s and 1960s drew support from all nationalities and helped jumpstart the struggles of Asian Americans, Chicano/Latinos, Native Americans and Native Hawai’ians. Today’s struggle for immigrant rights is also drawing support from other immigrants, especially oppressed nationality (African, Arab and Asian) communities who share the unjust treatment by a racist society that Mexicanos, Latinos and Chicanos face.

Another similarity between the African American movement and the struggle today is the role of militant students and youth. African American college students started the direct action, which spread around the country, of sitting-in at segregated facilities and also spearheaded the drive for Black Studies on college campuses. Today’s Chicano, Mexicano and Latino youth, both immigrants and the children of immigrants, are walking out of their schools to join protests against the attempts to criminalize the undocumented and scapegoat immigrants.

African American workers were the backbone of the civil rights movement, from those who boycotted the buses in Montgomery to the garbage workers on strike in Memphis where Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated. In today’s struggle Mexicano, Chicano and Latino workers have also been the backbone of the movement, not just swelling the ranks of demonstrators, but also as organizers of the protests. Thus it is quite natural that the immigrants’ rights protests will be on May 1, International Workers Day, which commemorates the struggle of American workers, many of whom were immigrants, in the 1880s for an eight-hour day.

In this spirit, we call upon workers of all nationalities to support their brother and sister Mexicano, Chicano and Latino workers, to fight for full equality for Mexicano and other Latino peoples and to uphold the right to self-determination for the Chicano Nation. This is because we share a common enemy – the capitalist class in general, and their representatives in the Bush administration and the right – that is behind the anti-immigrant, anti-Latino, anti-Black and anti-union policies of the government and the big corporations.

Long live May 1, International Workers Day!

Full equality for Mexicanos and all immigrants!

Self-determination for the African American and Chicano Nations!

Workers and oppressed peoples unite!

#UnitedStates #Editorial #MayDay #ChicanoLatino #selfdetermination #immigrantRights

Los Angeles, CA – Students, teachers and parents demonstrated here with Latinos Against War on March 20, the fifth anniversary of the invasion of Iraq, marching from Roosevelt High School to the building that houses a military recruiting center and the Eastside Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) center.

The militant protest hit the largest recruitment center in Los Angeles, which targets young Latinos in the East Los Angeles high schools.

Protesters also slammed the ICE raids and deportations, demanding full legalization for the 12 million immigrants. They also protested the increase in repression against Mexican, Chicano and Latinos communities, by ICE, which targets workplaces and engages in home raids.

The march and rally built support for the planned May 1 march for legalization, against ICE repression and opposing the war in Iraq. The march and rally will take place in downtown Los Angeles.

Latinos Against War organizers note they have organized a protest on the anniversary of the Iraq war for the last five years in Boyle Heights with the firm aim of building local grassroots movements for self-determination and against repression.

The march and rally was organized by Latinos Against War and Chicano Club El Sereno Middle School and supported by Mecha de RHS, American Friends Service Committee, International Action Center, Students for a Democratic Society-UCLA, SEIU 721 Latino Committee, May Day Unity Coalition and Padres Unidos de Boyle Heights.

#LosAngelesCA #AntiwarMovement #StudentMovement #News #Iraq #ChicanoLatino #militaryRecruitment #selfdetermination #LatinosAgainstWar #workplaceAndHomeRaids

There has been a lot of confusion as of late over war funding bills passed in the House and the Senate which include ‘timelines’ for U.S. troop withdrawal. Led by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Democrats in Congress are trying to convince the majority of Americans that they are taking steps to end the war. This is a lie.

Pelosi’s House bill calls for U.S. troops to leave Iraq by September 2008. However this same bill allows troops to remain in Iraq for “diplomatic protection, counterterrorism operations and training of Iraqi Security Forces…”, leaving over 60,000 troops to continue the occupation indefinitely. The Senate passed a similar bill, with a March 2008 date for troop withdrawal. The Democrats are well aware that they were elected in November because the American people voted against the war. People voted for an end to the war on Iraq.

Over 655,000 Iraqis and 3200 Americans have been killed already in this war. And every day the war continues, more Iraqis and more American soldiers die. Not one more death is acceptable. These so-called timelines do not end the war. Instead, these congressional bills extend the war for at least 12 to 18 months, with full funding, into 2009.

Not only does Pelosi’s bill allow a large number of troops to stay in Iraq, it also gives $124 billion more to fund the occupation. Any vote to fund the war is not a vote to end the war. On top of that money, the 2008 budget contains another $145 billion for the war, including $50 billion to go towards the war in fiscal year 2009. How can Congress say they are planning to end the war in 2008 when they are already setting money aside to fund it in 2009? They can’t. Approving money for war is supporting the war. Everyone who is against the war should demand that Congress end all funding of the occupation. Not one more dollar is acceptable.

We must reject U.S. government lies that, “U.S. troops are necessary to control the violence.” The U.S. led occupation is the main cause of killing and destruction. In fact the invasion and subsequent occupation of Iraq gave rise to a national liberation movement that will not rest until Iraq is in the hands of Iraqis.

Funding the war for months or years longer is no solution. It is a recipe for more death and destruction. Both the House and Senate bills continue an unjust war and provide loopholes for U.S. troops to stay in Iraq long after September 2008. We must stand together in opposing the U.S. government’s aims of creating permanent military bases, with U.S. soldiers stationed in a country where they are not wanted.

It is not the place of the Bush administration or the U.S. Congress to decide the future of Iraq. The right to self-determination means that only the Iraqi people should decide the future of their government and their country. Progressives in the U.S. should stand in solidarity with the demands of the Iraqi people – the vast majority of whom want the U.S. out. Therefore timelines that promise away Iraqi land for U.S. bases or allow the troops to stay in Iraq for any longer must be rejected by the anti-war movement.

No one should be deceived by empty promises and twisted words. While it is ultimately the Iraqi resistance that will defeat the occupation, the anti-war movement can hasten this process along if we unite all who can be united around strong and clear demands. Every person against the war on Iraq should support the self-determination of the Iraqi people and demand, “No money for war! U.S. out now!”

#UnitedStates #AntiwarMovement #Editorial #Iraq #defundIraqWar #IraqTimelineForTroopWithdrawal #selfdetermination #noMoneyForWar