Uhuru, Comrades and friends:
Uhuru means Freedom!
Today we are facing a watershed moment in human history when our movements for freedom, liberation and democracy can fight on to victory or be pushed back, silenced and defeated.
This is the moment when we must come together to vigorously fight as one, and win.
We must demand that the U.S. government drop the charges against the “Uhuru 3”: African People’s Socialist Party Chairman Omali Yeshitela along with African People’s Solidarity Chair Penny Hess and Uhuru Solidarity Movement Chair Jesse Nevel, two white organizers under the leadership of the APSP.
Leading organizations of the African Liberation Movement and those working for the liberation of other colonized peoples are coming under attack. The attacks on us as colonized peoples open the door for attacks on activists and workers fighting for the common will to express our democratic rights and end the U.S. war machine at home and abroad.
We are under attack by a government that wants to push us back to an earlier time. We say, we are not going back! We will not be silenced!
They are trying to return us to the days when African, Indigenous people and others endured daily terror inflicted on us for just trying to vote or protest or express our aspirations. A time when they murdered our children in church, aimed fire hoses on our protestors; a time when the McCarthy hearings sent some underground to burn their books. This time saw COINTELPRO, assassinations and political imprisonment of our leaders.
We refuse to go back!
They are trying to rob us of hard-won freedoms gained by the fierce struggle of African workers in the 1950s and 60s, and our comrades, the Indigenous, Mexican, Filipino and Puerto Rican people, along with the heroic peoples of Vietnam, Cuba, Occupied Palestine and Venezuela and supporters throughout world fighting against U.S. colonial war at home and abroad.
We say NO! We are not going back!
In the year following the violent military-style, pre-dawn FBI raids on seven properties and homes of the Uhuru Movement on July 29, 2022, we have seen the weaponization of the FBI and U.S. government expanded exponentially to other political targets and organizations spanning the political and ideological spectrum, and the repeal of many of our hard-fought-for rights.
In April 2023, Chairman Omali Yeshitela, Penny Hess and Jesse Nevel were indicted under bogus charges. They are awaiting trial for “conspiring to act as an agent of a foreign government and foreign officials, to wit, the Russian federation…in violation of 18 USC § 951(a) and § 371.”
These outrageous charges are coming from the Biden Administration and Democratic party, where some may seek refuge although it is actually the party that created the Crime Bill, ushered in militarized police, mass imprisonment of African people and the “war on drugs” that criminalized our communities and created a drug economy. This is the party that gets elected with the black vote but never does anything for colonized and working people in general.
We see the outrageous attacks and charges levied on the Stop Cop City movement which is fighting in Atlanta to prevent an untouched forest from being used to build a training ground for the brutal colonial police that target African people.
We see the attacks on Cuba, the Venceremos Brigade and Cuban solidarity organizations, the attacks on Venezuelan diplomat Alex Saab and the Tampa 5; the repeal of women’s right to choose, the increased powers to the secret FISA court, the exposure of massive civilian surveillance, the criminalization of black history taught in schools. We see the spying, interventions and attacks on those who stood up to fight the police murders of Mike Brown and George Floyd and others.
We see the continued imprisonment of Leonard Peltier, Mumia Abu Jamal, Ed Poindexter and others, and the deepened terror against the Palestinian people by the U.S.-backed Israeli state. We see on-going attacks on Julian Assange and other whistleblowers, as well as Matt Taibbi and Tara Reade. We saw the firing of Tucker Carlson, just after he featured Chairman Omali Yeshitela on his program.
Comrades, we must join together to push back these attacks. We must fiercely safeguard our freedom of speech, freedom of assembly and our precious right to organize for our liberation.
Historically the African Liberation Movement has led the movement, opening up democratic rights for all. In the 1950s and 60s it was the courageous struggle of black people that pushed back the McCarthy era and forced this government to grant civil and voting rights to African people.
It was the leadership of the Black Liberation Movement that ushered in women’s and LGBT-Q+ liberation movements.
In the 60s as now, the U.S. government’s assault on the black liberation movement opened the door for state attacks on others fighting for social justice, including freedom of speech.
The FBI clearly stated in their COINTELPRO documents that the Black Liberation Movement was “the greatest internal threat to U.S. security since the Civil War.” From Marcus Garvey in the 1920s to the attacks on Paul Robeson, WEB DuBois, James Baldwin and others the U.S. government has always targeted the struggle of African people.
The government hit the black liberation movement of the 60s with assassinations, mass imprisonment of black leaders and organizers, slander and infiltration. They installed neocolonial politicians ensconced in the democratic party, built highways over our thriving neighborhoods depriving us of our own economy and installed massive police presence in our communities trained to lock us up in prisons for life.
Chairman Omali Yeshitela and the African People’s Socialist Party (APSP) represents the continuum from the 1960s to today. The Chairman has fought relentlessly for the liberation and unification of Africa and African people everywhere. He has raised the voice of the African working class here and around the world in unity and solidarity with all struggling peoples and movements against colonialism. He is clear that the victory of African people is a victory for all colonized, freedom-loving peoples and workers of the world.
The Party is the longest existing black revolutionary organization in the US, founded in 1972 with the aim to complete the Black Revolution, which is why it is under attack. The Party has always built institutions such as the Black Power Blueprint, Uhuru Foods and Pies, The Burning Spear newspaper and many more.
From its inception, the Party has always fought mass imprisonment, police violence and for reparations, building organizations and programs addressing every aspect of life for African workers. The Party developed revolutionary theory rooted in practice, forwarding the understanding of the colonial mode of production.
The Party represents all the movements that are out there.
This is why the demand to “Drop the charges on the Uhuru 3” must be raised to the central question for all those fighting for liberation, freedom of speech and social justice. Free Chairman Omali Yeshitela and we free the world.
Today we see a crisis of imperialism brought about by resistance of the colonized and the end of the “unipolar world” and US hegemony built on slavery and genocide, colonial war and plunder. A weakened imperialism is a dangerous beast, but we can win if we unite.
Force this government to drop the charges on the Uhuru 3 and we have the basis to push back all attacks.
Comrades: this is the time to join the Hands Off Uhuru Fightback Coalition. We cannot win as separate forces; our strength is as one. Refuse to go back!!
We must build a new unity advancing the interests of the colonized, the oppressed, and all freedom-loving people.
We must march as one on the white house on Nov. 4, 2023, as part of the Black is Back Coalition’s Hands Off Uhuru! rally and march!
Adelante siempre. Venceremos!
Forward ever! Backwards never!
All Power to the People! Black Power to the African Nation!
Hands Off Uhuru! Hands Off Africa!
