From Niger to Haiti to Cop City, Defeat the War Against African People

From Niger to Haiti to Cop City, Defeat the War Against African People.

In the desperate bid for the U.S.-EU-NATO Axis of Domination to hold onto the unipolar world, the war on Africans globally intensifies. This reactionary legacy of Western colonialism is proving itself impenetrable to the fruitless reformist strategies of liberals. As the world is literally and figuratively engulfed by fire or drowning by floods, the most clear headed paths forward come from the radical Black left. The Black Alliance for Peace (BAP) is consistent in doing our part.

This month, the Haiti/Americas Team of BAP has been leading a call to action on Haiti to counter the Biden administration’s call for the UN to send a military force to intervene in Haiti with Kenya volunteering to serve as the Black face of white supremacy in a perverse claim to “restore order” in Haiti by invading the island nation in the name of Pan-Africanism. In the face of this imminent imperialist intervention BAP remains vigilant and is exposing these intercontinental contradictions. Kenya is willing to assist white supremacist in Haiti at the expense of the wishes and aspirations of the Haitian people.

While plans for the invasion in Haiti are being finalized, Africans are rising up in Niger to kick France out and regain control of their country and its immense mineral resources. In response the French refuse to leave and, with their U.S. partners in crime, plan to use the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) to invade Niger. Once again employing Black faces to carry out white supremist, imperialist designs.  Africans (black people) everywhere must be vigilant in defense of our interest. The imperialist, white supremacist empire is struggling with legitimacy and employing the age old tactic of “Divide and Conquer”.  As the repression increases, African resistance must also intensify.

BAP is acutely aware – while helping others become so – that the drive to build Cop City is not just in Atlanta but that there are similar projects in Newark and Baltimore to name a few and that the U.S. settler state is preparing to lash out even more as its empire continues to decline. It insists on sending billions to Ukraine and on the militarization of Africa, while more and more of its citizens join the ranks of the homeless, are denied the human right to healthcare, face obscene price hikes for basic necessities, crumbling infrastructure, and derailing trains. Look at the heavy handed approach to the organizers against Cop City. The same grand jury and prosecutor who is going after Trump and his associates with RICO charges, have also brought RICO charges against the Stop Cop City protestors. We will not forget that this follows the indictments against the Uhuru Movement earlier this year. Repression abroad and repression within the enclaves of those colonized in Western countries is what the Black working class has to look forward to. 

In the next month of October the Africa Team of BAP, and the organizing arm of our campaign “U.S. Out of Africa, Shut Down AFRICOM, will hold the 4th International Month of Action Against AFRICOM, under the theme “From Niger to Haiti to Cop City, Defeat the War Against African People.”

BAP Coordinating Committee Chairperson, Ajamu Baraka points out:

“The lived experiences of the colonized suggest that the difference between a white supremacist liberal imperialist order and something European activists label as fascism is indistinguishable.”

People are seeking and need an alternative which is why formations like BAP become more and more vital. There is no way out of the current moment we face except through revolutionary struggle and organization. BAP came in to fill a need - to rekindle the Black liberation movement, in particular the Black Radical Tradition; crystallizing the historic anti-war, anti-imperialist position of our people. With wars raging on between Russia and Ukraine raising the threat of a nuclear catastrophe, saber rattling against China over Taiwan that eerily resembles U.S. policy toward the Russia-Ukraine military conflict, and military destabilization across the entire African continent, there has never been a greater need to for the masses of the people to organize. It should be clear now that revolutionary struggle is the only solution.

With your support, BAP will continue to bring clarity to the context and the complexity of the struggle of African People around the world.

BAP IN THE STREETS

The Black Alliance for Peace - Washington, DC organized the “Hands Off Haiti! Rally & Demonstration” on Thursday, August 17 starting in front of the Kenyan embassy and marching to the Jamaican embassy saying no to foreign intervention and Black face imperialism.

Our members in Washington, D.C., came out for the #OffTheList actions on June 25 in support of removing Cuba from the US’s bogus list of state sponsors of terrorism.

BAP-DC, BAP-Baltimore and BAP member organization Pan-African Community Action tabled at the ONE DC Juneteenth commemoration on June 19.

The Black Alliance for Peace Western Region had a retreat building with each other and charting their course for the future. California, New Mexico, Arizona and Hawai’i were represented the weekend of Sept 15-16.

BAP - Washington, DC joined the #AfricaUnited Movement at the French Embassy on September 2 to demand #FranceOutOfNiger and #NoWarInNiger. A new generation of Africans is defending their homeland against imperialist oppression! BAP Coordinating Committee member and member organization Pan-African Community Action organizer Netfa Freeman spoke calling out the "Faux Pan-Africanism" of ECOWAS!

Watch All-African People’s Revolutionary Party (AAPRP) Central Committee & BAP Coordinating Committee member Rafiki Morris speak at the #NoWarInNiger rally.

BAP-Baltimore participated in CurbFest for Political Prisoners on September 2 in Baltimore. They raised awareness of political prisoners with music, performances, speakers, children's activities, letter writing, and a film screening of ‘The Pendleton 2: They Stood Up.’

BAP was part of the International People’s Tribunal on U.S. Imperialism: Sanctions, Blockades, Coercive Economic Measures delegation on a fact-finding mission in Venezuela in July. BAP Coordinating Committee member Margaret Kimberley testified in a hearing on the impact of U.S. sanctions.

BAP's 5-member delegation spent 9 days in Nicaragua in July to advance the construction of a Zone Of Peace in Nuestra América.

BAP was out in DC in solidarity with Nicaragua and all our brethren and sistren throughout the Americas & The Caribbean on July 16.

BAP members were in Atlanta for the National Black Radical Organizing Conference, organized by BAP member organization Community Movement Builders the weekend of June 23-25.

PRESS AND MEDIA

On the September 12th episode of “Voices With Vision”, the radio program produced and hosted by BAP Coordinating Committee member Netfa Freeman, along with Craig Hall and Latrice Vincent on WPFW (89.3 FM in Washington, D.C.), they pull BAP Coordinating Committee Chairperson, Ajamu Baraka and BAP Operations Team member and Community Movement Builders organizer coco (aka Malkia), in for a discussion about the fascist consequences of neoliberalism from the international to the local.

On the September 19th episode of “Voices With Vision” Netfa and Brother Craig talk to Abayomi Azikiwe, Editor of the Pan-African News Wire about what is transpiring in Niger and the broader Sahel region. They start this show off with the wisdom of freedom fighter and former political prisoner of 33 years until his release in 2014, Sekou Odinga, who is currently in the hospital recovering from serious health complications.

BAP Mid Atlantic Co-Coordinators Jacqueline Luqman and Rafiki Morris, as well as Netfa, are quoted in Sam P.K. Collins’ September 5, 2023 The Washington Informer article “Amid Power Shift in Sahel Region, Protesters Express Solidarity with African Masses” that covered the action outside of the French Embassy protesting France’s aggression against Niger.

On September 1, 2023, The News with Paul DeRienzo on WBAI in New York interviewed Netfa about “the coup in Gabon made in the West,” starting at the 12:50 mark. Netfa was also one of three guests on WBAI’s Voices of Resistance: A Collective of Women Fighters, with hosts Lucy Quesada Pagoada and Andreia Vizeu on September 10, 2023 discussing the 50th year after the coup in Chile, the assassination of Salvador Allende, and implications for revolutionary change today.

BAP is lifted up in the Pitchfork article, “Noname’s Fearless Complexity” profiling the rapper and BAP supporter Noname, by columnist Julianne Escobedo Shepherd.

Austin Cole, Co-Coordinator of the BAP Haiti-Americas Team and organizer with Black Lives Matter Boston and the MIT Graduate Student Union-UE, writes in the July 5th issue of Black Agenda Report, and talks on July 11th’s Voices With Vision, about how the Supreme Court decision which banned the use of race as a criterion for college admissions is indeed racist and also obscures the need for Black unity and for a new Black politics that explicitly calls for liberation. Austin is also interviewed both on the August 5th KPFA Evening News (starting 10 minutes in), and by BAP Coordinating Committee member and Black Agenda Report Executive Editor Margaret Kimberley on the August 25th episode of Black Agenda Radio about Kenya's intervention in Haiti as "Imperialism in Black Face.” 

BAP Outreach Coordinator, Africa Team and Coordinating Committee member, Tunde Osazua broke things down on a public political education webinar about recent developments across West Africa, including the levying of sanctions and threats of military action against Niger, hosted by BAP Solidarity Network member organization Democratic Socialists of America Internationalist Committee's Middle East and Africa Subcommittee. Tunde also joined The Critical Hour to discuss how the cost of Africa’s relationship with the West exceeds the benefit and explained how trade and financial sanctions have been put in place to cripple Zimbabwe due to its move towards land reform. And he says that the new military alliance between Mali, Niger, and Burkina Faso has an economic facet that can be built upon.

BAP Coordinating Committee members, Erica Caines and Ajamu, and BAP member Salifu Mack tag-teamed on the EYL 30 and ELY 29 episodes of Black Power Media’s “Earn Your Liberation” to unpack the political complexities around developments in the West and Central Africa Sahel region.

In two completed parts of a three part series, BAP member and national racial and climate justice advocate, Anthony Karefa Rogers-Wright writes in Black Agenda Report about “How Joe Biden and The Democratic Party’s Climate Agenda Increases Environmental Racism More Than It Reduces Emissions”(Part1) and “How a Not So Secret Listserv Exercises white ‘Supremacy’ Ideology In Lieu of Climate and Racial Justice” (Part 2).

EVENTS

September 27: the topic of BAP member organization Pan-African Community Action (PACA)’s next Assata Shakur Study Group is “Fascism in DC: Police Surveillance, Occupation, and Militarization” from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. ET. Participate in-person at Black Workers & Wellness Center, 2500 Martin Luther King, Jr., Ave., SE, Washington, D.C. or for online, register here.

October 1: is the kick-off webinar for the International Month of Action Against AFRICOM, “From Niger to Haiti to Cop City, Defeat the War Against African People” from 1pm to 2:30 pm Eastern Time. Register here.

October 8: join BAP-Atlanta from 4-6pm for this film screening and community discussion about "Walter Rodney: What They Don't Want You to Know" at the Little Five Points Community Center, 1083 Austin Ave NE Atlanta, GA 30307. More info.

October 15: join The Maroon Legacy Keepers, a BAP member organization, at the free Seventh Annual Prisoners' Families Brunch, from noon to 4pm for free food, drinks, entertainment, speakers, and information. Celebrate beloved ancestor and freedom fighter Russell Maroon Shoatz, at One Art Community Center, 1435 N. 52nd Street, Philadelphia PA 19131. More info.

No Compromise, No Retreat!

Struggle to win,

Ajamu, Austin, Dedan, Erica, Jacqueline, Jaribu, Jemima, Julie, Margaret, Matt, Netfa, Nnamdi, Noah, Paul, Rafiki, Tunde and Yasmin

Coordinating Committee

P.S. Freedom isn’t free.Consider giving today.

Banner phote: Ukrainian tank opens fire on targets in Avdiivka, in Ukraine's eastern Donetsk region, on April 17, 2023 (courtesy Muhammed Enes Yildirim/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images).

For the Anti-Democratic, Corrupt U.S. Duopoly, Peace Is a Four-Letter Word

For the Anti-Democratic, Corrupt U.S. Duopoly, Peace Is a Four-Letter Word

Cuba was placed back on the infamous list of so-called state sponsors of terrorism by the U.S. state, a state responsible for more terror than any other state or empire in the annals of human history. What was Cuba’s crime, according to the proto-fascist Trump administration, when Cuba was placed back on that list in December 2020? Cuba had hosted the initial round of peace talks between the Colombian government and the Colombians’ second oldest armed opposition group, the National Liberation Army, better known as the ELN.

When China brokered a reconciliation between Saudi Arabia and Iran that could lead to a possible peace agreement ending the horrific war in Yemen, the United States reacted with outrage. How dare these states exercise their own agency! Next, they might finally come to understand the war in Yemen and the tensions in West Asia (otherwise known as the Middle East) only benefited the United States.

The war in Ethiopia, the coup and violence in the Sudan, the introduction of U.S. troops into Peru to prop up its coup government, and the bloody and unnecessary proxy war between NATO and Russia in the Ukraine are just a few examples of the immoral and criminal activities of the United States that help to explain why global polls consistently identify the United States as the greatest threat to international peace in the world.  

Yet, there is no opposition to this madness, especially not from the Democratic Party.

Both U.S. capitalist parties support the militarist thrust of U.S. policies, internationally and domestically. The year 2024 will see a Pentagon budget of over $886 billion, overwhelmingly supported by both parties, and which is consuming over 60 percent of the non-discretionary federal budget. In other words, money for housing, education, public health, and spending that might actually improve the quality of life for workers is reduced, so that the people’s resources can be reallocated to war to protect and extend the interest of a rapacious capitalist class committed to global plunder.

But just calling attention to or opposing the dangerous logic that informs the U.S. commitment to the doctrine of global “full spectrum dominance”—with its military-first strategy—is now generating a repressive response from the U.S. legal apparatus.

The Black Alliance for Peace, however, will not be intimidated. Our commitment to peace is irreversible because we are absolutely clear on the issue of peace. We understand fully that there can be no peace without justice and that this position is not a cliché, but an axiom.

As the Black is Back Coalition for Social Justice, Peace and Reparations, of which  BAP is a member, reminds us, the demand for peace should not be “interpreted to be an imperialist peace, the type of peace that the slave master can appreciate as long as the slaves are not resisting and the system of slavery goes unchallenged. When we say peace, we mean the peace that accompanies social justice, a peace that can only come through fierce uncompromising resistance designed to overturn the relationship between the oppressed and the oppressor…”

The U.S. political class has exposed itself as an enemy of peace. And for them, peace is a four-letter word. Through our campaign work and mass political-education work—from the struggles against Cop City in Atlanta to our new campaign to make the Americas a “Zone of Peace”—BAP demystifies the oppressive relationships that sustain dominance and points the way toward a liberated future, in which all can experience authentic peace and social security.

Help us build this new world.

BAP IN THE STREETS

BAP members from Baltimore, Washington, D.C., and southern California attended the Americas Policy Forum, on April 29 at American University in Washington, D.C. Haiti/Americas Team Co-Coordinator Jemima Pierre spoke about the West using Haiti as a laboratory for the repression it plans to unleash throughout Latin America and the Caribbean. Watch her talk on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and YouTube.

BAP-Philly member Asantewaa Mawusi Nkrumah-Ture speaking out on May Day or International Workers’ Day on May 1. Photo credit: Joe Piette 

BAP-NYC member Allendy and BAP Solidarity Network member Danny Shaw joined a KOMOKODA demonstration outside of Columbia University's commencement event to protest Hillary Clinton being appointed a professor for the 2023-24 academic year. 

BAP-NYC supported the #Uhuru3 on Saturday in Newark, New Jersey, during the May 27th Hands Off Uhuru Day of Action. Read BAP's position on the U.S. state's attack on our movement.

The Baltimore gathering was among the many African Liberation Day events that took place over the past few weeks. Watch BAP-Baltimore Coordinator Erica Caines’ whole talk on YouTube, Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. Watch BAP-DC’s highlights reel on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.

BAP-NYC members, BAP-Atlanta members and BAP member organization Malcolm X Center for Self Determination founder Efia Nwangaza gathered for a panel discussion hosted by The People's Forum. The discussion is one of the events taking place on the side of the second session of the United Nations’ Permanent Forum on People of African Descent. The discussion featured BAP member organization AfroResistance Executive Director Janvieve Williams Comrie and Clau O'Brien Moscoso, member of BAP-NYC and the BAP Haiti/Americas Team. The event was titled, “Racial Justice, Reparation and Development in the Context of International Crisis: Contributions to the Development of Afrodescendant Peoples from an Intersectional Perspective.” It can be viewed here.

BAP-Philly members Gassoh, Stoke (Malik) and Asantewaa attended the “No Arena in Chinatown” rally and march on June 10 in Philadelphia. Approximately 3,500 people of various ages, genders and ethnic backgrounds protested professional basketball team the Philadelphia 76ers’ proposed arena in the city’s Chinatown as a racist act of gentrification.

PRESS AND MEDIA

Julie Varughese, co-coordinator of BAP’s Solidarity Network wrote two articles that may be of interest to the movement. A two-year-old argument about "anti-Blackness" in Cuba, which African/Black solidarity activists in the United States say has no basis in reality, has reared its head. BAP members Kimberly Miller and Asantewaa Nkrumah-Ture are quoted in this piece. Plus, the “Uhuru 3,” three of the four U.S.-based defendants—who are members of the African People's Socialist Party—spoke out for the first time since U.S. government indictments dropped last month that accuse them of trying to work with Russia to sow social discord in the United States. Julie reported on their press conference.

An organizer with the BAP Haiti/Americas Team, living between Lima, Peru, and the United States, Clau O'Brien Moscoso’s Black Agenda Report article, “Approval of US Troops to Train Peruvian Armed Forces Proves U.S. Behind Coup” was also republished in Orinoco Tribune.

On the June 6 episode of “Voices With Vision,” the radio program produced and hosted by BAP Coordinating Committee member Netfa Freeman, along with Craig Hall and Latrice Vincent on WPFW (89.3 FM in Washington, D.C.), they interview the executive director of BAP member organization Community Movement Builders, Kamau Franklin, to get the latest on the struggle to stop Cop City in Atlanta, a take that’s “not for the politically faint of heart.” The episode also features two presentations from a lunch and book discussion, co-sponsored by BAP, “Unveiling Truth and Inspiring Change – Survivors Uncensored.” Delphine Yandamutso of the Rwanda Accountability Initiative and co-author of a book, Survivors Uncensored: 100 + Testimonies of Resilience and Humanity, and Salome Ayuak of BAP’s Africa Team spoke.

Starting with political prisoner Mumia Abu Jamal’s latest commentary, “Red Horizons," the June 13 episode of WPFW’s “Voices With Vision” radio program interviewed Devin Walker (aka Uncle Devin) of The Uncle Devin Show. The discussion exposed the corruption of the government of Washington, D.C., which has implications for Mayor Muriel Bowser’s supposed Racial Equity Plans, involving the misuse of hundreds of millions of dollars in DC Public School contracts. The second half of this episode replays a timeless 2017 speech by the late Glen Ford of Black Agenda Report that illuminates the warmongering geopolitics of the United States.

Peter James Hudson, a member of BAP’s Haiti/Americas Team, as well as Jemima Pierre, a co-coordinator of that team, each testified at the Haiti Hearing for the International Peoples Tribunal on U.S. Imperialism. Their remarks begin on the timestamps 18:46 minutes and 1:22:05 hours, respectively.

The June 1, 2023 episode of “The RemiX Morning Show” on Black Power Media invited Netfa to recap and evaluate Pan-African Community Action’s special collaborative Assata Shakur Study Group session on “Internationalism, Malcolm X, African Liberation Day.” They also discussed the need for collective political education. Netfa comes into the show at the 1:05:30 mark.

Netfa and BAP Coordinating Committee Chairperson Ajamu Baraka tag team in an interview on “The Critical Hour” to discuss FBI attacks on the Black liberation movement, why Cuba must defeat the blockade without waiting for it to be lifted, and African nations coming together to push back against imperialism in the new Cold War. This interview starts at 57:30 into the two hours.

Ajamu’s testimony at the recent International People's Tribunal on U.S. Imperialism on Cuba—viewable in this video and read as text in Black Agenda Report—lays out how the United States qualifies as the true rogue state by waging war against the Cuban people for more than 60 years, designating Cuba as a state sponsor of terrorism to justify sanctions and military threats, and causing great suffering in the island nation.

Margaret Kimberley, BAP Coordinating Committee member and Executive Editor of Black Agenda Report, conducts an in depth interview with Dr. Cornel West about his 2024 presidential campaign, his platform, and decision to be a candidate for the Green Party nomination.

BAP Solidarity Network member Sarina Larson was interviewed live on Pacifica Radio station KPFK’s “The Lawyers Guild” radio program on June 7 to discuss Cop City and the First Amendment. She starts 30 minutes into the show.

EVENTS

June 15: The Party for Socialism & Liberation (PSL) is hosting, “20 Years: Iraq, U.S. Empire and America's (Mis)Education System,” at Philadelphia Liberation Center at 6 p.m. ET. This event is a reflection on the two decades since the United States invaded Iraq. It will be moderated by Saskia Kercy of BAP-Philly. More information here.

June 15: Hear from a panel of four BAP members who went on the 2023 May Day Brigade to Cuba. “May Day Reflections on Cuba: Advancing the Zone of Peace” will be a multimedia report reflecting on the seminars and forums they attended, connections they made with the Cuban people, their experience participating in May Day celebrations, and bonds developed with people from other countries who also came to Cuba. Also hear about how solidarity with Cuba fits into BAP's campaign for Our Americas to be recognized and respected as a Zone of Peace. Attend 7:30 p.m. to 9 p.m. ET. Register here.

June 17: Join U.S. Hands Off Cuba Committee for “Report Back From U.S. Delegations to Cuba: May Day, Trade Union & Solidarity Conferences” at the Koreatown Immigrant Workers Alliance in Los Angeles, California, and online, from 2 p.m. - 4 p.m. PT (5 p.m. - 7 p.m. ET). Join this event to educate and mobilize people to Washington, D.C., to get the U.S. government off Cuba’s back once and for all! BAP-Atlanta member Damion Scott will be among the speakers. Here is the link to participate in this hybrid event.

June 23-25: BAP member organization Community Movement Builders will be hosting the “National Black Radical Organizing Conference” with the theme, “Unity in our Lifetime: Connecting the National Black Struggle for Self-Determination with Pan-Africanism.” Registration fee: $25. Register here. 

June 25: Join protests demanding U.S. President Joe Biden take Cuba off the list of “State Sponsors of Terrorism.” A rally will be held at the White House coinciding with local protests across the United States. The organizers say, “Let’s make our voices loud and clear: ‘Cuba is not a ‘terrorist’ state! End U.S. terrorism against Cuba!’ Endorse the action. Organizers request supporters on social media use the hashtag, #OffTheList.

June 28: The topic of BAP member organization Pan-African Community Action (PACA)’s next Assata Shakur Study Group is “Visions for Community Control of the Police” from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. ET. Participate in-person at Black Workers & Wellness Center, 2500 Martin Luther King, Jr., Ave., SE, Washington, D.C. or for online, register here.

July 1: Is a virtual party and hangout for the release of the second edition of the book, “The Myth and Propaganda of Black Buying Power; Media, Race, Economics” by Jared A. Ball. Jared is a BAP member; professor of both communication and Africana studies at Morgan State University; host of the podcast, “iMiXWHATiLiKE!”; and co-founder of Black Power Media. Bring your comments, questions, criticism, and maybe win a free signed copy! Join at 7 p.m. ET here.

No Compromise, No Retreat!

Struggle to win,

Ajamu, Austin, Dedan, Erica, Jacqueline, Jaribu, Jemima, Julie, Margaret, Matt, Netfa, Nnamdi, Noah, Paul, Rafiki, Tunde and Yasmin

Coordinating Committee

P.S. Freedom isn’t free.Consider giving today.

Banner photo: A billboard in Cuba that says in Spanish "70% of Cubans were born under the blockade" (Courtesy celag.org)