From Asa Somali Anpu
My name is Asa Somali Anpu, and I am a follower of the Uhuru Movement from the African continent (South Africa’s townships specifically). When I was a young university student in 2012, I heard a hip hop song that sampled a presentation on why black people in the ghettoes live as we do (the drug economy and horizontal violence). The presenter spoke only for 3 minutes but had elucidated something that was so illusive to me throughout my whole life–but it related to where I lived. That presenter was named Chairman Omali Yeshitela.
His abilities as a leader were not based on his acuity or his efficiency, they are based on his compassion. When I texted him on Facebook, his statement was that he was no better than I and that we are going to see the end of ‘the big man’ lording over the rest of humanity–this changed my way of thinking and relating to those around me. I have since then met Chairman Omali many times (online and physically when he came to South Africa) and what I have seen in this good man is that what he calls us to become individually, is what he has found objectively possible to internalize subjectively–becoming a living example that humankind can earnestly embody love in ACTION as a primary disposition.
Chairman Omali has started a community newspaper in the 60s when the black community was in peril due to the program of COINTELPRO; he also created a think tank known as the African People’s Socialist Party to combat the after effects and causes of the aforementioned program’s negative effects on our community; he then went on to mobilize people across color lines to unite in unity with the defence of African people’s humanity. The Chairman has helped a lot of young women and men get off drugs and other destructive tendencies just through his words and programs in the community.
These are all but a fraction of the reasons for which I humbly ask you, Hon. Judge, to allow Chairman Omali leniency so that my community, and the entire planet earth, can continue to see the potential of practical love and people-centred culture.
From Ward Churchill
My name is Ward Churchill. I am 77 years of age, a retired professor of American Indian Studies and chair of the Department of Ethnic Studies at the University of Colorado at Boulder. I’ve published more than 20 books, several in translation, and well over 200 articles and book chapters. I’m also a life member of Vietnam Veterans Against the War (VVAW), was a member of the original Rainbow Coalition in Chicago, and was part of the leadership council of the American Indian Movement of Colorado (Colorado AIM) until moving to Atlanta in 2012.
I have known Omali Yeshitela since the mid-1980s and have known of him since shortly after returning from Vietnam in 1969 (when he was still known as Joe Waller). During the decades that have elapsed since our first direct encounter, my career as an academic and author, as well as my activism, has led to my participation in various seminars, conferences, and other such activities organized by Omali’s African People’s Socialist Party (APSP) and International People’s Democratic Uhuru Movement. I have also published material in the APSP’s Burning Spear newspaper, while Omali and I have been repeatedly invited to share a dais as speakers at universities and social fora in both the U.S. and Canada.
Suffice it to say that throughout this entire period, I have found Omali’s intellectual output to be penetrating, complex and profound, yet—whether delivered orally or in his 13 books and hundreds of articles—invariably framed in a manner that is readily understandable to people residing at the grassroots. No less importantly, in my view, although he has continuously updated and sought to perfect his articulations, Omali has proven himself undeviating in his adherence to the bedrock principles he’s been advancing since at least as early as 1972, i.e.: anti-imperialism, anticolonialism, antiracism, self-determination, community self-sufficiency, and participatory democracy. These, I submit, are all elements of international law, and I know of no one who has been more consistent in asserting them than Omali Yeshitela. Without purporting to have agreed with him on every point along the way—far from it, in fact—I must say that the stimulation I’ve experienced as a result of Omali’s intellectual production would undoubtedly have compelled my ongoing engagement with him. The more so, since Omali’s theorizing has never been offered as a mere abstraction but has been applied to the APSP’s and Uhuru Movement’s community organizing efforts in various inner cities around the country—notably in St. Petersburg (FL), Oakland (CA), and St. Louis (MO), but elsewhere as well—and thus subjected to testing under “real world” conditions. Despite their having been resource poor, faced with strong opposition from local elites, and subject to outright physical repression, these efforts have in each case generated tangible material, psychological, and sociopolitical benefits to the impoverished and disempowered communities at issue.
It has been said to me by an 83-year-old veteran of the civil rights movement that Omali is the only member of his generation who has continued the struggle mounted by the Black Liberation Movement in the terms by which it was defined at its inception. Others of that steadily dwindling cohort have agreed. These opinions were without exception voiced as a signification of respect.
That Omali remains fully active in these endeavors at 82-years-of-age is quite remarkable in the estimation of this near-80-year-old commentator. That he’s stayed the course for well over half-a-century without opting at any point to personally enrich himself or take a more comfortable station in life is more striking still. How one is to assess the integrity of an individual is obviously ambiguous, yet no matter how one approaches the question as regards Omali it seems to me that he can only be adjudged as a man imbued with integrity of the highest order, an attribute to which must be added his honesty and unswerving commitment to humanity. On balance, I can only conclude that Omali Yeshitela is far more deserving of commendation than condemnation.
That he should now find himself facing a possible 5-year prison sentence for “conspiring” to do what he was acquitted of doing is a situation too bizarre for words. It is my understanding that there is no minimum penalty applicable to the charge at hand, and that you exercise complete discretion in sentencing. I therefore urge you to impose the most lenient possible sentence upon this defendant.
From Efia Nwangaza
My name is Efia Nwangaza, 77 years old. I have been a civil/human rights legal worker/attorney, and community organizer for more than 60 years. I worked first with my father’s Apostalic church and NAACP Youth Chapters, then the 1960s Atlanta based Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). Currently, I am the founding director of the Malcolm X Center for Self Determination (1988) and WMXP Community Radio (2010), a volunteer, grassroots, community based multimedia human rights organization.
Chairman Omali Yeshitela (The Chairman), over 80 years old, the leader of the African People’s Socialist Party (APSP) and the Uhuru (Freedom) Movement, is also a SNCC veteran, my colleague, and a lifelong human rights advocate. He is an optimistic, inspiring, and transformative stalwart who has successfully served Black people specifically and humanity broadly for more than 60 years despite unrelenting resistance and barriers.
Having come out of the U.S. military, then going into the historic battles for Black public accommodation and voting rights of the Civil Rights Movement, The Chairman saw that none restored the dignity, self worth and respect of Black people, or put power over Black lives in the hands of the masses of Black People. He, like SNCC organizers throughout the South, worked to inspire, educate, engage, and organize mass participation and relationships throughout the United States and abroad. In an attempt to give U.S. civic mechanisms and opportunities meaning, Chairman Omali ran for public office. He set a high standard of ethics, discipline, and commitment to the interests of the Black community.
Today, the African People’s Socialist Party (APSP), the Uhuru (Freedom) Movement, nationally supports and trains others to run for office, builds self sustaining and empowering businesses and institutions to advance and promote the communities’ interests and well-being. He is a much sought after and prolific author, one of today’s most cogent political theoreticians and commentators; from the United Nations, UK’s Oxford University to international meetings in Europe, Africa, and emerging nations throughout the Western Hemisphere, as well as the former Soviet Union.
While the Uhuru Movement’s many projects, nationally and internationally, directly benefit Black/African people, white allies reclaim and reconstruct their humanity and priorities by working along side and sharing skills and experiences under their leadership in the Black Power Blueprint and African Internationalism. Inter-generational, cross cultural, community building Uhuru projects include, but are not limited to, adult and youth leadership and wellness training, cooperative economic development guidance with use of the Movement’s local commercial kitchens and community event spaces, retail stores, publishing and broadcasting facilities, re-entry training and transitional housing, community gardens, farmers’ markets, and its maternal and infant healthcare training program in Sierra Leon, West Africa.
Chairman Omali Yeshitela has been a prominent activist for Black liberation and African socialism for decades. His work on addressing systemic racism, colonialism, and the economic and social conditions faced by African-descended people globally is consequential.
Chairman Omali Yeshitela’s removal and absence from the community can threaten community services, cause severe harm, and amplify ever present questions about the efficacy of Anglo-US jurisprudence and commitment to human rights and the application of the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment to Black people. The U.S. government has a long history of surveillance and suppression of Black and leftist political organizations (e.g., COINTELPRO targeting civil rights groups and Black leaders like Martin Luther King Jr. and the Black Panther Party). Chairman Omali’s advocacy, rooted in the long tradition of African liberation movements, both in the U.S. and globally, for self-determination, reparations, and anti-imperialism, even if controversial to some, should be protected under the U.S. Constitution’s provisions for free speech.
Moreover, in addition to decades of resounding community service and benefits, Chairman Yeshitela’s activism has been non-violent. It has been focused on human relations and development through political education, community organizing, and grassroots efforts to address systemic inequality. There is no justification for jail time.
It is for these reasons and many proven others that I join the community in asking for the most lenient possible sentence in this case. The numerous communities he serves need Chairman Yeshitela to be able to continue his philanthropic work in neighborhoods from which the government has divested and others have overlooked for generations.
Thank you for your time and effort. Please do not hesitate to contact me should you have any questions or require additional information.
Sincerely,
Atty. Efia Nwangaza, Director
Malcolm X Center for Self Determination/WMXP Community Radio
