Leading up to the Derek Chauvin verdict, members of the International People’s Democratic Uhuru Movement (InPDUM), under the leadership of the African People’s Socialist Party (APSP), traveled from far and wide to Minneapolis, MN to participate in the uprising occurring on the ground.
African Resistance Now was able to speak with Kalambayi Andenet, the International President of InPDUM, and discuss the people’s rebellion in Minneapolis, the Derek Chauvin verdict and African people’s solution for preventing more George Floyds from being killed.
African Resistance Now (ARN): After the verdict was given, members of InPDUM throughout the midwest, under the leadership of the African People’s Socialist Party (APSP), mobilized to Minneapolis.
President Kalambayi, why do you feel it was necessary for the Uhuru Movement to be in Minneapolis?
President Kalambayi Andenet: It was necessary for us to be there because we have to be everywhere the masses of the people are resisting in order to make sure that our struggle doesn’t turn into any kind of opportunist struggle. We make sure that the struggle is in the interests of the African working class.
ARN: What did you observe in Minneapolis?
Pres: One thing we can see in Minneapolis is how the State will try to pacify the people. The State had no choice but to offer up a guilty verdict because they knew that property and value would be destroyed if they didn’t. They had to pacify the people.
They had all the usual people who are sent in to pacify the people, like Jesse Jackson. These neocolonial puppets are sent everywhere the people are resisting in order to tell the people the “proper” way to resist. But it was clear what the masses wanted.
Just like how in Ferguson, the people were chanting “kill the police,” there was an African woman in Minneapolis who told me the chant was “We don’t want no justice; we don’t want no peace – we want her head hanging from a tree!” [referring to Kim Potter, the cop who killed Daunte Wright]. That’s what the people were saying.
The people in Minneapolis know that George Floyd isn’t an isolated incident. They know that there’s just going to be another George Floyd and then another because it’s not about “one bad cop;” it’s about an entire social system that hunts down and kills African people.
ARN: How do you feel about the Chauvin verdict? Do you think this represents progress?
Pres: No, it doesn’t. They can’t lock up one killer cop and call it progress while Mike Brown and Sandra Bland’s killers are still running free. It’s not about just one cop. We live in a social system that says that it’s ok for police to act as terrorists in the black community. And as long as we dont have power, this is what will continue to happen. Our fight isn’t to put one cop on trial or in jail; we’re putting this whole system on trial. We’re putting America on trial.
ARN: So what do you mean when you say “put America on trial”?
Pres: Everything that we see happening to African people in the world points to genocide. If you look up the word genocide in the dictionary, you’ll see a description of the lives of our people.
From the police killing us to the gentrification happening in our community, to the shutting down of our schools to the food deserts in our community to the prison system—these conditions all point to a genocide being committed against us. In every aspect of our lives, we see this. It’s a must that we charge this country with genocide.
ARN: This reminds me of our Africans Charge Genocide campaign.
Pres: Exactly. Chairman Omali Yeshitela declared that our people have to use the term “genocide” to describe our living conditions; it has to be a household world. When this word was first used to describe the experiences of Jewish people in the Holocaust, it was never intended for us to use the term to describe our conditions – but it’s the most appropriate word to use.
Any time we talk about the oppressed conditions of our people, we’re talking about the effects of genocide. That’s why it is righteous and just that we charge America with genocide.
ARN: I understand. So that’s why we have to put America on trial.
Pres: Yes, because this system can’t give us justice. They can’t give us justice because they are unjust. They need to be put on trial.
How do these criminals get to decide what’s just and what’s not? How does America get to say what’s humane and what’s not when the whole creation of this country was done through inhumane actions?
ARN: This brings us to Ma’Khia Bryant, the sister who was killed the same day as the Chauvin verdict. There are some people out there who say that while the George Floyd murder was police brutality, the Ma’Khia Bryant killing was justified because she had a knife. How do you feel about this?
Pres: I’m not even asking questions anymore. I don’t need to see any footage or anything. We all need to go beyond asking all these questions because it doesn’t matter if you had a knife, if you’re in your house, in your bed, on your couch. It doesn’t matter if you had a knife, had a gun, dropped the gun, had your hands up, had your hands by your side—none of that matters.
These people will kill you every time just because you’re black and make up whatever excuse they need to. They’ll mistake this for that. They’ll say that thing looked like this thing, and they misunderstood so that’s why they killed you, etc.
They will always have a reason. So again, this system can’t set the terms for what’s just and what’s not. We have to deal with their crimes against us.
ARN: We’re just tired of these pigs gunning our people down. How can we put a stop to it?
Pres: We need State power. We have to fight for power. This won’t stop. They will keep on killing us until we have power.
We can’t ask for anything less. We can’t be bamboozled by anything else. We need State power to arrest the police who brutalize us, State power to protect our homes against gentrification and State power to control the economics of our community.
Until we have that, these things will continue to happen to us. We have no choice but to organize for power—Black Power. We have to join InPDUM. We can’t keep asking questions, and we have no more tears to cry. It’s time to get organized.
We have no more tears to cry; it’s time to get organized.
