VIDEO: Occupy Imperialism: National Convention, June 9-10, Philadelphia, PA
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The official video trailer for “Occupy Imperialism: Crisis, Resistance, and Solidarity with the liberation of African and oppressed peoples”, the National Convention of the Uhuru Solidarity Movement, June 9-10, Philadelphia, PA. Register today at www.occupyimperialism.org.
White people, join the worldwide struggle to change the world! Solidarity with the liberation of African and oppressed peoples. Imperialism must go!
Take the Pledge of Solidarity! Make a donation and leave a statement of solidarity. These statements will be read during a special section of the USM National Convention. Add your voice to those in solidarity with liberation for african and oppressed people! http://www.apscuhuru.org/campaigns/apsd2011/pledge.xhtml
BREAKING NEWS! PSTA Apologizes; Driver No Longer Allowed to Operate DART Service
::::BREAKING NEWS::::
PSTA Apologizes; Driver No Longer Allowed to Operate DART service on PSTA’s behalf!
The struggle continues!
The Uhuru Solidarity Movement wants to express our appreciation for everyone who took action to defend our comrade Johann Bedingfield by calling in and emailing PSTA and Pinellas County Commission to demand the termination of CareRide driver Mike Sullivan, who assaulted Johann and made violent threats towards disabled people, as well as the African and Mexican communities.
PSTA CEO Brad Miller issued a formal apology in the form of an email response to all of the emails he received from you:
I received emails from each of you in the last 24 hours regarding a very serious allegation of abuse by a contracted bus driver for PSTA. PSTA has completed its investigation into this matter….PSTA has required that Care Ride no longer allow this bus driver to operate DART service on PSTA’s behalf. We can’t terminate him because he’s not our employee. But he won’t be driving for DART.
HERE IS WHAT YOU CAN DO:
Call and Email Douglas Johnson, the Owner of CareRide
Phone # : (727) 866-1193
Email: Douglas.Johnson@baycare.org
What to say:
I demand the immediate termination of employment of Mike Sullivan for abuse against Johann Bedingfield and statements of violence against disabled people, as well as the black and Mexican communities. I am also demanding that CareRide make a formal apology for their unwillingness to take seriously the mistreatment of their customers, to install surveillance cameras in all vehicles to ensure the safety of the clients, and the implement a transparent, formal process for filing reports of abuse by employees.
–
Below is a statement sent in by our comrade Johann:
They cannot stop us for standing in solidarity with African and Mexican people! If I say I support African heroes like Hydra Lacy and Lovell Mixon for protecting their community, their jailed nation, resisting colonialism while the real murderers and thieves are on Wall Street wreaking havoc on this beautiful planet and on the ones with humanity, I have a right to support that! Every white person has the right to support that! I’m disabled but deeper still is the fact that we must defend our right to be in solidarity with African and Mexican and all colonized people! This will be the “atonement”, our second chance. The original sin was when we Europeans assaulted Africa, the Indigenous peoples of this land (as Chairman Omali Yeshitela points out) that parasites call america! Not in my name, in your name anymore! Lovers of Freedom, those who yearn for reparations, to be human again, we must defend our right to join in solidarity and not be assaulted and harassed! Mike Sullivan and all white nationalists must go! And…Occupy Imperialism!
Join us tonight at 6:30PM for an OCCUPY IMPERIALISM INFO-SESSION at www.livestream.com/reparationsinaction to learn more about the organization of which Johann is a member and who is waging this campaign, the Uhuru Solidarity Movement.
Join us in person on Thursday night, 7:30PM at the Hungry for Revolution! Vegan Potluck to share a delicious potluck dinner with like-minded people who are sick of injustice and ready to take action for a new kind of world! We will be sharing more updates on the campaign at this event as well. This will be held at St. Pete Community Acupuncture, 14 18th Street South, Saint Petersburg, FL 33712. For more info contact 727-683-9949 or stpete@uhurusolidarity.org.
Uhuru Means Freedom!
Join the Uhuru Solidarity Movement!
Call In! Demand Termination of White Nationalist Driver Who Assaulted Our Comrade Johann Bedingfield!
Johann Bedingfield, Uhuru Solidarity Movement organizer, was attacked by wheelchair transport driver. Call In and Email to Demand Justice! (Info Below)
Comrades, Members and Supporters of the Uhuru Solidarity Movement,
On the date of May 6th, USM member and cadre organizer of the African People’s Solidarity Committee, Johann Bedingfield, was attacked by a driver of the CareRide wheelchair transportation company named Michael Sullivan.
Johann has been a member of APSC and the Uhuru Solidarity Movement for 5 years and is known in the movement and the community at large for his powerful, uncompromising stance of solidarity with the African community’s right to self-determination, economic development, and freedom.
Johann Bedingfield has cerebral palsy and relies on CareRide for transportation. On the date in question, he was on his way from his home in Largo to the Uhuru Radiothon at the Uhuru House in St Pete, the international headquarters of the African People’s Socialist Party.
The driver Michael Sullivan’s hostility first became apparent months earlier on the date of March 1st. As Johann’s in-home support provider and fellow USM organizer Jesse Nevel was assisting him in exiting his house, Sullivan said, “Just drop him on the ground and let him roll around like a wheel barrel.” During that car ride, he said, “I wish I had a sight on my windshield so I could aim my gun and shoot old women off their wheelchairs and steal their wheelchairs and sell it for drugs on south St Pete.”
Johann did not see Sullivan again until the morning of May 6, 8:30 AM, when he came to pick him up from his house and transport him to the Uhuru House where the Uhuru Radiothon was being broadcast and in which Johann would be participating in carrying out the radiothon to support the independent media apparatus of the African People’s Socialist Party. When he first got on board the vehicle, after he strapped the chair down, Sullivan wrapped the seatbelt around Johann’s throat and said, “How would it feel if I choked you?” Johann reported that he felt terrified for his life and threatened by Sullivan’s actions.
During the car ride, on the way to the Uhuru House in the African community of south St Pete, Sullivan said, “I wish I could blow away all them niggers and Mexicans.” At this point Johann requested to cease the conversation, but Sullivan proceedd to taunt him for the rest of the car ride with questions such as, “What’s the matter? You’re awfully quiet back there, aren’t you?
When Johann called to report these remarks and Sullivan’s physical attack to CareRide, the Supervisor, by the name of Vince Cocks, defended the driver, saying “I’ve known him for ten years” and made a veiled threat to Johann, saying “We try to protect our drivers. And I don’t want anything to happen to Johann.” When asked, “What would happen to Johann?”, Cocks replied, “I don’t know…”
When it was clear that Cocks was interested only in protecting the white nationalist driver who had threatened violence towards our comrade, Johann decided to report the incident to the CareRide administrator, Douglass Johnson. Similarly, Johnson accused Johann of “exaggerating” and said that it was unlikely that Sullivan would be fired for what he had done, instead he would more likely be subject to a “sensitivity training.”
At this point, Johann reported the incident to the Largo Police. The police said they would not do anything because there was “no proof.” The officer also dismissed Johann’s suggestion that further measures should be taken by CareRide to ensure the safety of their customers such as installing surveillance cameras. “Yeah, they’re not going to do that,” said the cop.
Johann has filed a written complaint to CareRide, PSTA, and to the Pinellas County Commission. This complaint will also be publicized on the media including on this blog.
As an organization of white allies of African liberation working under the APSP’s leadership to defend the democratic and human rights of African people, we see this attack on Johann as an attack on his free speech and his right to stand in solidarity with the African community.
Johann is a constant on-the-ground organizer with USM, staffing outreach tables, distributing thousands of fliers and leaflets for events, selling hundreds of issues of The Burning Spear Newspaper, recruiting into the Uhuru Solidarity Movement through social media, and always a presence at Uhuru Movement events where he makes contributions of material solidarity to support the programs of African People’s Socialist Party. Often his use of the CareRide transport service is to allow for him to be able to attend Uhuru Movement events where he takes an active role in participating and carrying them out.
Johann is a tireless organizer and leader in the solidarity movement. He reported the attacks on his person and the driver’s anti-African remarks not merely because he himself was disturbed and threatened by what happened, but because he recognized Sullivan as a threat to other disabled people, as well as to the African and Mexican communities.
We are calling on everyone who stands on the side of freedom and justice to take action and call-in and email PSTA and the Pinellas County Commission to make the following demands:
1. FIRE MIKE SULLIVAN! Sullivan must go! We demand the immediate termination of employment of Mike Sullivan for abuse against disabled customers and statements of violence against disabled people, as well as the black and Mexican communities.
2. A formal apology from PSTA, as well as an apology from CareRide for their unwillingness to take seriously the mistreatement of their customers by employed drivers.
3. The installation of surveillance cameras in all vehicles to ensure the safety of all clients.
4. The implementation of a transparent, formal process for filing reports of abuse by employees and course of action that protects the customers.
Here is a script for you to use when you call in or email the contact info listed below:
I am calling to demand the immediate termination of employment of Mike Sullivan for abuse against Johann Bedingfield and statements of violence against disabled people, as well as the black and Mexican communities. I am also demanding that PSTA and CareRide make a formal apology for their unwillingness to take seriously the mistreatment of their customers, to install surveillance cameras in all vehicles to ensure the safety of the clients, and the implement a transparent, formal process for filing reports of abuse by employees.
CALL AND EMAIL INFO:
Email PSTA CEO Brad Miller bmiller@psta.net
Email PSTA Human Resources Director Larry Longenecker llongenecker@psta.net
Call PSTA: (727) 540-1900
Call Pinellas County Commission at 727 464-3614
Beyond OWS: Building a People’s Movement to End Imperialism
Occupy Imperialism, National Convention of the Uhuru Solidarity Movement, will be held on June 9-10, 2012 in Philadelphia, PA. Register today at OccupyImperialism.org
The Uhuru Solidarity Movement calls on you to join us in an organizing conference June 9 and 10 in Philadelphia to target the foundation on which Wall Street rests and to stand in solidarity with the worldwide resistance of African and Indigenous peoples as the vehicle for social transformation.
This is a call to stand against imperialism and in solidarity with African, Mexican and Indigenous peoples’ demands for liberation and self-determination inside this country and around the world.
We, the Uhuru Solidarity Movement, are concerned that:
- While African, Mexican and Indigenous people strike out daily in organized and unorganized resistance against the intensifying iron hand of the police state imposed upon them, this is a non-issue for an Occupy movement concerned generally about student loans, mortgages and pensions and the rights of white people.
- There is little outcry about the deepening Wall Street-backed terror being waged by the Obama administration against the people of Afghanistan, Pakistan, Libya, Syria, Iran, the Congo, Uganda, Somalia and throughout Africa, as well as in Central and South America as a desperate imperialism attempts to push back the people’s anti-imperialist movements and governments.
- Even as this economic crisis unfolds the wealth gap between white people and African and Mexican people is growing, with white households now holding 20 times the wealth of African households and 18 times the wealth of Mexican families inside the U.S.
- The horrific U.S. prison system, with as many as 7 million people under “correctional supervision,” and its attendant daily police violence, murders and terror is a hideous crime against humanity that goes unchallenged and uncondemned by the Occupy Movement.
- Prisons are not about crime control but about control of oppressed, impoverished populations. White bankers whose crimes have destroyed the lives of millions of people around the world do not go to prison; poor African men do.
As Adam Gopnik wrote recently in the New Yorker magazine:
“For a great many poor people in America, particularly poor black men, prison is a destination that braids through an ordinary life, much as high school and college do for rich white ones…Mass incarceration on a scale almost unexampled in human history is a fundamental fact of our country today—perhaps the fundamental fact, as slavery was the fundamental fact of 1850.”
Yet this “fundamental fact” is not even discussed in a movement concerned with the newfound contradictions of the white middle class people occupying Wall Street.
- An imprisoned brown and black population, now nearly the size of New York City, is the basis for the ever growing, highly lucrative prison industry from which Wall Street and much of white American has benefitted for a very long time. Where is the outcry against our American gulag?
- African people are the majority of those gunned down and brutalized every day by the highly militarized police forces who have been encamped and riding roughshod in African and Mexican communities all over the U.S. for decades before they turned their batons on white demonstrators.
As we face another election year it’s time to leave behind the electoral contest between two sectors of Wall Street-backed elite. It is time to abandon a me first agenda that in effect demands that Wall Street continue its worldwide plunder in order to keep on meeting our needs.
It is time to build a movement of white people dedicated to ending a system of oppressors and the oppressed and being part of building a world in which all human beings can live in peace and prosperity, by standing in genuine solidarity with African and other oppressed peoples who struggles for self-determination are bringing down the pedestal on which Wall Street rests.
Take the Pledge of Solidarity! – Taking the Pledge of Solidarity is a concrete way to show your support for the revolutionary struggles of African people for national liberation and self-determination. It is also a way to make your voice heard at the upcoming Occupy Imperialism: Uhuru Solidary Movement (USM) National Convention. Your statement about why you took the Pledge of Solidarity will be read aloud to the USM general membership and other convention attendees on the first day of the two-day convention on June 9, 2012.
UHURU MEANS FREEDOM!
TUESDAY 6:30PM EST: OCCUPY IMPERIALISM ONLINE INFO-SESSION
The call to occupy imperialism – come to Philly June 9-10
Stop the war on the African & Mexican communities inside the U.S!
Stop Obama’s worldwide wars!
Solidarity with the resistance of African and oppressed peoples!
Join the INFO SESSON:
TUES May 22 • 6:30pm EST
LIVE via Livestream.com/reparationsinaction
Tune in and participate via Livestream in a 30-minute information session about the upcoming “Occupy Imperialism: Crisis, Resistance, Solidarity” – the national convention of the Uhuru Solidarity Movement – to be held in Philadelphia on June 9-10.
Occupy Imperialism Info Session Tuesday, May 22nd – 6:30pm EST
Ask yourself:
Why is Uhuru Solidarity Movement different from any other organization?
Why is “Occupy Imperialism!” The June 9-10 National Convention of USM different from any other kind of event I could attend?
Why is it about more than just talk?
What is my role in a movement that’s going to change this unjust system?
Want to know the answers?
Join the Occupy Imperialism Info Session THIS Tuesday, May 22nd at 6:30pm EST and find out! It’s time for a people’s movement! Get involved in the movement that stands in solidarity with the movement for national liberation of African, indigenous and other oppressed peoples worldwide.
Hear from Uhuru Solidarity Movement organizers and other people just like you who are sick of this unjust system!
Questions? Contact Uhuru Solidarity Movement at registration@uhurusolidarity.org
NEW BOOK! Quotations from Chairman Omali Yeshitela
Burning Spear Publications is proud to announcethe upcoming release of the new book
Quotations From Chairman Omali Yeshitela
- Over 140 quotations, organized
by topic - Foreword by African Socialist International (ASI) Secretary General, Luwezi Kinshasa
- Convenient pocket-size format
Pre-order now through Friday, May 25 to get your copy signed
by the Chairman!
$12 plus shipping
Delivery options for pre-orders
Pick up at African Liberation Day
in Washington, DC on May 26
- or -
have it shipped to your door
During the Black Revolution of the Sixties, the Black Panthers sold the “little red book,” Quotations From Chairman Mao Tsetung.
Over forty years later, the African Revolution has a leader of our own, Chairman of the African People’s Socialist Party and the African Socialist International, Omali Yeshitela.
Yeshitela is the leading force organizing to unify and liberate Africa and African people everywhere. He has spent his life in the trenches building the African Revolution as the only solution to the poverty, oppression and colonial violence faced by black people on the continent of Africa, inside the U.S. and around the world.
To mark the 40th anniversary of its founding, the African People’s Socialist Party has compiled some of the Chairman’s best quotations into this “little black book.”
Published in a portable pocket-size format and organized into over 40 topics, Quotations From Chairman Omali Yeshitela is a concise, practical guide to the revolutionary political theory of African Internationalism.
It’s an invaluable tool to arm the minds and actions of African people and our allies as we struggle to understand and change the world.
ARE YOU SICK OF THIS UNJUST SYSTEM?
Featuring workshops and presentations on:
- U.S. Wars of Occupation
- Imperialist Obama Administration
- Anti-Black Violence
- Jim Crow Prisons
- Criminal Wall Street Banksters
- Parasitic Capitalism
Take a stand in solidarity with the resistance of African and oppressed peoples of the world!
REGISTER TODAY! occupyimperialism.org
Only $25 for BOTH days • Or $15 for one day
Saturday, June 9th:
First Unitarian Church • 2125 Chestnut Street • 10am-6pm
Sunday, June 10th:
Moonstone Arts Center • 110A 13th Street, Upstairs • 9am-2pm
Take the Pledge of Solidarity!
Taking the Pledge of Solidarity is a concrete way to show your support for the revolutionary struggles of African people for national liberation and self-determination. It is also a way to make your voice heard at the upcoming Occupy Imperialism: Uhuru Solidary Movement (USM) National Convention. Your statement about why you took the Pledge of Solidarity will be read aloud to the USM general membership and other convention attendees on the first day of the two-day convention on June 9, 2012.
“Africa’s Future in African Hands” event in St Pete wins support and resources for African self-determination
Africa’s Future in African Hands Tour in St Pete, FL on May 2nd was a huge success!
Mother’s Day Event: Don’t miss your last opportunity to attend an AFIAH tour event. Nurse-Midwife Mary Koroma will be speaking at the final event of the nationwide tour on Sunday, May 13, 2012 at 4:00 pm. Location: Akwaaba Hall, 1245 18th Ave. S., St. Petersburg. More information: 727-821-6620.
The St. Pete stop on the international “Africa’s Future in African Hands” tour was a huge success, winning resources and support for the programs of the African People’s Development and Empowerment Project (AAPDEP), an organization of the Uhuru Movement. The AAPDEP in Sierra Leone, West Africa, is headed up by Nurse-Midwife Mary Koroma.
Nurse Mary was the main speaker at the event. Her presentation, exposing the conditions of poverty and oppression faced by Africans and the wide array of projects that are being built by Africans in AAPDEP in West Africa, profoundly impacted everyone in attendance, and moved many to contribute resources to this work, which was the goal of the tour.
In a country that is plagued by the ongoing legacy of colonialism, Sierra Leone has the highest rate of infant and maternal mortality rates in the world. While NGOs and “charity” organizations assume that the problem is some kind of deficiency of African people, AAPDEP correctly understands that the problem faced by Africans is a lack of self-determination. Africa is the richest continent on the planet in terms of natural resources. Sierra Leone produces the highest quality diamonds in the world, but those diamonds do not benefit the people of Sierra Leone. If Africans had control of their own resources, it is Europe and the United States who would be asking for charity. Africans would be the richest people on the planet.
Penny Hess, Chairwoman of the African People’s Solidarity Committee, gave a presentation exposing how the real problem is colonialism, a system of plunder and theft of Africa’s resources. The solution, as AADPEP and Nurse Mary are proving, is African self-determination.
“Africa’s Future in African Hands” (AFIAH) was a tremendous opportunity for those of us in the US and Europe, particularly in the white community who benefit from all of the resources stolen from African people, to take an active stand of solidarity with the struggle of Africans for self-determination and freedom from colonial rule.
Gaida Kambon, Secretary General of the African People’s Socialist Party, which leads the Uhuru Movement, gave a presentation that placed the work of AAPDEP in the context of the APSP’s overall strategy to build programs that empower African people to seize control of the means of production. Comrade Gaida’s presentation laid bare the difference between a charity organization, which demoralizes the African population and treats them as needy and helpless, and the self-determination programs of AAPDEP, built on the principle that Africans in control of their own destinies will be able to solve the crises faced by Africans around the world.
Camilla Hippolyte, organizer of the AAPDEP organization in the US and one of the key leaders of the AFIAH tour, presented on the vision of AAPDEP to build self-reliance projects from farming ventures to community gardens whereever Africans are located, including inside the US. Camilla explained that Africans possesses all of the skills and knowledge of the work that is needed to address the issues of poverty, disease and lack of genuine economic development. What is needed are the resources.
Participants of this event had the chance to ask questions direclty of Nurse Mary and other speakers in a lively discussion that ended with a rousing statement from Nurse Mary who said, “If you touch one, you must touch all. One Africa! One Nation!”
Be sure to tune in tonight for a live study of The Burning Spear Newspaper at 7:30PM EST at www.livestream.com/reparationsinaction where the Uhuru Solidarity Movement will be discussing the piece, “Birth justice for African women means an end to colonialism,” by Ayesha Fleary of AAPDEP.
Don’t miss your last opportunity to attend an AFIAH tour event. Nurse-Midwife Mary Koroma will be speaking at the final event of the nationwide tour on Sunday, May 13, 2012 at 4:00 pm. Location: Akwaaba Hall, 1245 18th Ave. S., St. Petersburg. More information: 727-821-6620.
Africa’s Future in African Hands! Long Live AAPDEP!
Solidarity with African Self-Determination!
Uhuru!
Bakari Olatunji freed! Another victory for the people!
Shared from Uhuru News:
The people are victorious! Oakland police drop charges! Bakari Olatunji freed! Forward to the Oakland Freedom Summer Project!
Free Bakari! Call in to the Oakland Police and DA!
The Uhuru Solidarity Movement shares the following urgent memo from InPDUM and calls on all of our members and supporters to call in to the Chief of Police: 510-238-3131, OPD Jail Division: 510-238-3455 and the Alameda County District Attorney’s Office: (510) 268-7500, and demand the immediate release of Rickey Clay on the grounds that he is a political prisoner, locked up only because of his beliefs – and NOT because he violated some law! Free Rickey Clay, aka Bakari Olatunji! Drop all charges!
FREE BAKARI! CALL IN TO THE OAKLAND POLICE AND DA!
On today, Tue, May 8 at 2PM PST, Bakari Olatunji aka Rickey Clay will be arraigned on felony charges stemming from the police attack on him and other members of the Uhuru Movement during a Oakland Police Dept “open house” event. The Committee to Free Bakari Olatunji is calling on everyone to participate in the struggle in the following ways:
If you are in Oakland: Come out to demonstrate at 1pm at 7th and Washington at the Wiley Manuel Courthouse. Come show support in court in Dept 112.
EVERYBODY: Call the Oakland Police Dept, Chief of Police and Alameda County District Attorney demanding the immediate release of Rickey Clay on the grounds that he is a political prisoner, locked up only because of his beliefs – and NOT because he violated some law.
Chief of Police: 510-238-3131, OPD Jail Division: 510-238-3455 and the Alameda County District Attorney’s Office: (510) 268-7500
Join the Free Bakari Committee and Register for the Oakland Freedom Summer Project, where we will bring in forces from throughout the world into Oakland to participate in grassroots organizing work for self determination to the African community of Oakland. To register go to uhurusummerproject.org.
Background of the case:
On Friday, May 4, comrade Bakari Olatunji aka Rickey Clay, a 20+ year veteran of the Uhuru Movement, was viciously attacked and arrested by Oakland Police as we attempted to serve the people’s subpoeana to the Oakland police Chief Jordan. Bakari is currently being held for ransom at the notorious Santa Rita County Jail on $25,000 bail. He has been charged with California Penal Code 69, a felony which basically means “threatening an officer or resisting arrest with force or violence.”
The struggle began as the Oakland branch of InPDUM held a press conference in front of the police headquarters in Oakland. The purpose of the press conference at which we announced the Court for Black Justice and Reparations – scheduled for Sat, May 5 at the Uhuru House. Through the Court for Black Justice, the African community, under the leadership of INPDUM, will put the Oakland Police Dept on trial for crimes of colonial genocide against the African community. The press conference was strategically planned to be held at the same time and location as the “police-community relations” meeting, at the Oakland Police Headquarters. The plan was to go straight from the press conference and demonstration to the police event, where InPDUM organizers would physically serve the People’s Subpoeana to Police Chief Howard Jordan, who was expected to be in attendance.
When InPDUM organizers attempted to enter the building where the meeting was being held we were immediately blocked from entering the building and told that we were not allowed to go inside. This is despite the fact that the police were allowing people to come and go freely beforem during and after our press conference. This revealed to us that the police were only interested in allowing Africans to the event who were not interested in criticizing the brutal relationship the police have with the African community.
After long, heated debate with the police – all in full view of InPDUM supporters and ruling class and independent media, the police had no choice but to allow us to enter the building. IT was either that or be forced to admit that the police is willing to abrogate our right to free speech as a means of avoiding our criticisms of them. When we entered the building Police Chief Jordan was nowhere to be found, further illustrating our point. As we searched the room for Jordan, several InPDUM organizers, including President Diop Olugbala and local leader Bakari Olatunji, were immediately attacked by the pigs and physically removed from the building. After this blatant attack on our movement and our right to peaceful assembly, after the police succeeding in ousting us from the building, Bakar Olatunji then sustained another attack. He was targeted by the police, placed in handcuffs and dragged away.
InPDUM Oakland immediately jumped to action, holding another press conference to sum up the attack and mobilize onlookers to attend the Court for Black Justice. Later that evening we held a candlelight vigil in honor and memory of all Africans who were killed at the hands of the OPD. During the candlelight vigil we mobilized even more support for the Free Bakari campaign.
By arresting Bakari the police intended to demoralize our forces and discourage us from resisting. However, this attack has only served to deepen our resolve and will to resist. We are currently moving forward to hold the Court for Black Justice and Reparations and struggle for a People’s Sentence which will, among other things, call for the immediate release and exoneration of Rickey Clay aka Bakari Olatunji.
Bakari has been released from Santa Rita jail on $25000 bail – the 10% of which was fronted by a family friend. However, we still have to raise the money to reimburse her. Therefore, we are calling on all lovers of freedom and social justice to make a donation to the bail fund.
