Dear Chris:

I really did not want to write this open letter, and would have preferred to speak to you in person, in private. Indeed, ever since the domestic violence incident with Rihanna two years ago there have been attempts, by some of the women currently or formerly in your circle, women who love and care deeply about you, to bring you and I together, as they felt my own life story, my own life experiences, might be of some help in your journey. For whatever reasons, that never happened. By pure coincidence, I wound up in a Harlem recording studio with you about three months ago, as I was meeting up with R&B singer Olivia and her manager. You were hosting a listening session for your album-in-progress and the room was filled with gushing supporters, with a very large security guard outside the studio door. I was allowed in, as I assume you knew my name, and my long relationship to the music industry. I greeted you and said I would love to have a talk with you, but I am not even sure you heard a single word I said above the loud music. I gave your security person my card when I left, asked him to ask you to phone me, but you never did, for whatever reasons. And that is fine.

by Molefi Kete Asante  

The fundamental stimulus of the attack on Libya is greed, not the protection of the Libyan people. In fact, the people of Libya have suffered more during this bombardment by Western powers and their allies than during the entire 41 years of the leadership of Muammar al-Gaddafi.

There are several rationales that have been advanced in the public for the reason for the assault on Libya. The attackers have said that Gaddafi has used force against his own people. They say that they are trying to prevent revenge attacks on the people who have risen against the leader of Libya. They also say that Gaddafi’s government has lost its legitimacy. None of these arguments make much sense in reality, and they conceal the attempt at exploitation, appropriation of Libyan petroleum and colonial incursion to demonstrate the will of the West in Africa.

by Ezili Dantò

(March 18, 2011) – Aristide returned to Haiti today. I’ve not seen such genuine happiness on the faces of Haiti’s poor in over seven years.

Welcome, President Jean Bertrand Aristide and family. Today is a good day for the poorest of the poor in the Western Hemisphere. Their struggle and unimaginable sacrifices and sufferings bore fruit and it makes them smile. We thank the universal good for this moment. Blessed be the endless Haiti revolution against the organized tyranny of the “civilized” and “schooled” peoples.

Today, HLLN remembers the blessed Haiti revolution, Janjak Desalin and the indigenous Haiti army of today and yesterday.

On this day of the return, HLLN remembers the sacrifice of the warriors of Site Soley, Bel Air, Solino, Martissant who took up arms in self-defense against the occupation and coup d’etat. We remember the most hunted Black man in the Western Hemisphere, who, alone, fought the most powerful armies on earth for two long years before he was assassinated by U.N. bullets. We remember the lynching and crucifixion of Dred Wilmè.

“On July 6, 2005, … Dred Wilmè in his family were assassinated in cold blood by 1,440 heavily armed U.N./U.S. troops. With their tanks, helicopters and advanced weapons, 440 U.N./U.S. soldiers entered Site Soley in the dead of night – at 3 a.m. – while the community was asleep. One thousand more U.N./U.S. soldiers surrounded Site Soley to make sure no one could leave. Bombs where reported unleashed and dropped on the unarmed civilian community.

“According to The Site Soley Massacre Declassification Project, the U.N. fired over 22,000 rounds of ammunition into this thin-shacked, cardboard-house, poverty-stricken Black community of about 450,000 Haitians, most having been forced off their safer rural lands by U.S./USAID/WB/IMF policies in the ‘80s and ‘90s.”

All human beings have the right to life and to self-defense, including the poor in Haiti.

Today, we remember and pay honor and respect to our fallen and faceless warriors – the beleaguered poor in Site Soley, Solino, Martissant, Bel-Air, Gran Ravine et al. – ravaged by exclusion and color-coded NGO charitable distribution and allotments that slays human dignity, brings perpetual dependency. We recall the 20,000 slaughtered by the imposed Bush Boca Raton regime from 2004 to 2006, slaughtered with the complicity of U.N./U.S. firepower.

We pay tribute to Father Gerard Jean Juste, Lovinsky Pierre Antoine and all those who gave their lives for this day of return of the people’s voice. We pay tribute to the tens of thousands of unknown Haitians, in Haiti and in the Diaspora, who never wavered.

We lift up Hazel and Randall Robinson for staying true throughout this long road and always, always supporting justice for the people of Haiti against all the odds. We lift up Minister Louis Farrakhan and Danny Glover who stood with the poor majority in Haiti and advocated for the return of Aristide in Haiti when most of the U.S. Black intelligentsia turned away.

We thank all those folks, from all the races and religions, who signed letters and advocated for this return. We pay tribute to all the small Haiti radio programs abroad and in Haiti who stood for justice, Mary at SF Bay View for standing firm and resolute. We remember the unknown fanm vanyans, Haitian women like Alina Sixto who sacrificed so much for so long without accolades and recognition and who never wavered.

We share this day by lifting up the work and life of our beloved John Maxwell. We pay tribute to the Africans – in Jamaica, in South Africa – who stood in solidarity with the people of Haiti despite threats of repercussions from powerful international forces, those who this week ignored the frantic calls from Barack Obama and the U.N.’s Ban Ki-moon to again delay and destroy the will of the people of Haiti. Thank you.

This historic return belongs to the poor suffering warriors of Haiti and blesses the spirits of those who perished too soon. Indeed it belongs to Haitian men like Father Gerard Jean Juste, to all the women community leaders who were singled out and massacred at the USAID/IOM “Summer for Peace” soccer gathering on Aug. 20 and Aug. 21, 2005, where Haitian youths were lured to their slaughter while attending a soccer game sponsored by USAID. Haiti’s young were brutally chopped up by U.N./U.S.-sanctioned coup d’etat police squads, working with their Lame Ti Manchet thugs and mercenaries.

This return belongs to Esterne Bruner, assassinated Sept. 21, 2006, by members of the coup d’etat enforcers, Lame Ti Manchèt.

Before his death, the courageous Esterne Bruner provided Ezili’s HLLN with the names of the members who committed the Gran Ravine/USAID-soccer-for-peace massacres, the names of the death squad of Lame Ti Manchet. None of these pro-coup d’etat enforcers have been brought to justice in U.N.-occupied Haiti because they helped demobilize the pro-democracy Lavalas movement.

This return that eases the insult of the bicentennial coup d’etat belongs to the hundreds of Haitians, sealed in containers and dumped off the coast of Cap Haitian to drown, as U.S.-supported thugs, still roaming Haiti free behind U.N. protection today, took over the North. It belongs to those forced onto mysterious U.S. ships off the shores of Haiti, held and tortured in secrecy, some for two years, because they voted Lavalas or held positions in the popular government of President Aristide.

It belongs to Haitian men like Emmanuel Dred Wilmè who never left his people, never even left his neighborhood. He never attacked anyone; he simply defended his community from attack from the coup d’etat overseers, from U.N. and U.S. guns and sycophants who hired thugs like Labanye to kill innocent civilians simply because they voted for Jean Bertrand Aristide and advocated for their country’s own domestic interests as opposed to the interests of the internationals, their Haiti billionaire oligarchy and poverty pimping USAID-NGO subcontractors.

There will always be more Dred Wilmés, more Father Jean Justes, more Lovinsky Pierre Antoines, more Esterne Bruners in Haiti as long as there is misery and exclusion imposed on Haiti by the powerful nations.

Most of all today, we say honor and respect to the Ezili Haitian Lawyers Leadership Network members, of all the races and nationalities, a 10,000-strong network against the profit-over-people folks, reaching 3 million per post and on our blogs, who stood with the voiceless and disenfranchised in Haiti for these last seven years against all the odds, against all the naysayers.

This historic moment belongs to all of you who stood with the indigenous Haitians at HLLN who work to make a space for Haiti’s authentic voices without officialdom’s approval. It’s a harsh journey.

The return could have been a six-hour trip to Brazil and then just a few hours to Haiti. But it took 18 hours because the “benevolent internationals” interested in our “democracy and stability” wouldn’t allow former President Aristide, the symbol of the poor’s empowerment in Black Haiti, to travel through their territories.

It took 18 hours for Aristide to reach Haiti. Going from South Africa to Northern Africa in Senegal took 10 hours, while from Senegal to Haiti took another eight hours. I hear England wouldn’t allow a landing either.

That long, long road is symbolic of the Haitian struggle. That long road Ezili’s HLLN has shared with you and with your support and forbearance. Unlike colonial celebritism with Sean Penn, no one will give us accolades for a mere six months journey in Haiti. Ours is a centuries-long journey. We overstand. The struggle continues.

A new era begins for us here at HLLN. We ask you help us define it. For we know the empire will strike back. We expect it and thus avoid the surprise blow. As usual, we shall take the road less traveled towards healing Haiti’s poor majority with dignity, human rights, self-sufficiency, justice and inclusion. We won’t sell out. Haiti and indigenous Haitians want justice not charity, not Clinton/Farmer U.N./U.S. paternalism. It’s a desperately humiliating, bumpy, wholly disemboweling, wholly healing and fulfilling ride. Against all odds, Ginen poze. Kenbe la – hold on. (See “Don’t be distracted by Aristide in Haiti” by Ezili Dantò and “Avatar Haiti.”)

Pierre Labossiere, Alina Sixto, Lavarice Gaudin, Jafrikayiti, Guy Antoine, Harry Fouche, Fritz Pean, Yves Point Du Jour, Jean Ristil Jean Baptise and too many others to name, congratulations on this day. Only we know what we’ve withstood in helping to overcome not one but two Bush coup d’etats on the poor majority in Haiti.

Sometimes the fierce guilt of surviving, the endless stretch ahead, the soul and psychic wounds wrought on by the shame and humiliation of powerlessness and lack of material resources to do more are too heavy a load. It’s too ugly and desperate to articulate the bullying and blows metered out by the most educated, most wealthy and most powerful on the most defenseless and non-violent people on earth.

Their collective suffering and deaths shall not be in vain. Justice will prevail, beauty will win, eventually – if not in our lifetime, then in the next. We are the Haitians, the indigenous Haitians. From generation to generation, from the womb to the tomb, our lives are about struggle.

Today, for a moment, we’ll smile* because in this shining and eternal moment that must see us through what will come at us next, we anti-Duvalierist Haitians managed to survive whole with dignity and to witness that against all odds, we beat back the elite’s rabid rage.

Ayibobo! The Haitian resistance against the Western bicentennial re-colonization of Haiti lives on.

by Mumia Abu-Jamal

Written for the People’s Hearing on Racism and Police, Oakland, California, Feb. 19 and 20, 2011

At the age of 15, Mumia was already a journalist for the Black Panther newspaper. This photo was taken in 1970. – Photo: Philadelphia Inquirer

Ona Move! Long Live John Africa! All Power to the People!

I greet you all as we look at what’s happening in the world – and try to figure out why, and how? When most people hear the acronym COINTELPRO (FBI code-speak for its COunter INTELligence PROgram), they think of the 1960s and perhaps the Black Panther Party, the Weathermen or the antiwar movement.

In fact, this government program didn’t begin in the ‘60s, nor did it end in the ‘70s – despite what newspaper accounts report, or what government PR people claim.

I know this because I did the research, read government reports, read actual files – many uncovered by the break-in of FBI field offices in Media, Penn., in the early ‘70s – and works by FBI defectors, who told the inside story.

by Cynthia McKinney

Haitian activist Da’vid and former Congresswoman and 2008 presidential candidate Cynthia McKinney were panelists at a mid-January pan-African conference in Tripoli. – Photo: Minister of Information JR

In 2005 in the basement of the United States Capitol at a meeting convened by Congressman John Conyers on the subject of the “Downing Street Memo,” Ray McGovern uttered the following truth: He testified that “the United States went to war in Iraq for oil, Israel and military bases craved by administration neocons” so that “the United States and Israel could dominate that part of the world.” McGovern went on to testify truthfully that “Israel is not allowed to be brought up in polite conversation. The last time I did this, the previous director of Central Intelligence called me anti-Semitic.”

The routine condemnations of McGovern could be heard from all of the sources inside the U.S. political structure that has at its base finance from pro-Israel sources, including from Dr. Howard Dean, who was chair of the Democratic National Committee at the time. This finance nexus has been thoroughly identified by Dr. James Petras, for those who want to do further reading.

Written by REUTERS    Monday, 21 March

  
The Obama administration said Monday that the former Haitian president Jean-Bertrand Aristide should refrain from returning to Haiti before the presidential runoff election on Sunday. A State Department spokesman, Mark Toner, said that Mr. Aristide, above, had the right to return, but doing so this week “can only be seen as a conscious choice to impact Haiti’s elections.” A delay, Mr. Toner said, would “permit the Haitian people to cast their ballots in a peaceful atmosphere.” He said the United States was asking South Africa, where Mr. Aristide has lived in exile since 2004, to delay his departure. Mr. Aristide’s lawyer, Ira Kurzban, said the United States “should leave that decision to the democratically elected government instead of seeking to dictate the terms under which a Haitian citizen may return to his country.”

by Mumia Abu-Jamal

Have you noticed that politicians flit from boogey-man to boogey-man, a process of demonization that is usually little more than misdirection from more pressing problems?

According to a number of new governors across the country, the newest boogey-men (and I guess boogey-women) are teachers, who are portrayed as greedy, selfish, and overpaid.

Desperate to avoid US military involvement in Libya in the event of a prolonged struggle between the Gaddafi regime and its opponents, the Americans have asked Saudi Arabia if it can supply weapons to the rebels in
Benghazi. The Saudi Kingdom, already facing a "day of rage" from its 10 percent Shia Muslim community on Friday, with a ban on all demonstrations, has so far failed to respond to Washington's highly classified request, although King Abdullah personally loathes the Libyan leader, who tried to assassinate him just over a year ago. Washington's request is in line with other US military co-operation with the Saudis. The royal family in Jeddah, which was deeply involved in the Contra scandal during the Reagan administration, gave immediate support to American efforts to arm guerrillas fighting the Soviet army in Afghanistan in 1980 and later ­ to America's chagrin ­ also funded
and armed the Taliban.

Last year the legendary rap group dead prez celebrated 10 years since they dropped their monumental classic album "Lets Get Free". Since then, they have dropped a lot of music together, including a dead prez album that they did with the Outlawz called "Can't Sell Dope Forever", and they also have done solo albums. The group consists of Stic.man and M1, and at this point the dj is Mike Flo. They will be coming to the Bay Area to perform at Yoshi's in San Francisco, this Friday. we wanted to catch up wit' dead prez to talk a little bit about what has been going on with them lately since they dropped their free mixtape, "Revolutionary But Gangsta Grillz", which was one of the dopest albums dropped in 2010. Don't take my word for it, you can get it at deadprez.com. Here is Stic.man, one half of the revolutionary rap group in this exclusive Q&A....

M.O.I. JR: You just dropped a free mixtape called "Revolutionary But Gangsta Grillz", what inspred y'all to do this mixtape?

by Minister of Information JR 

   

Aisha SekmetWhen I was riding in Memphis last year, my homegirl Phu’cha put me up on this revolutionary gangsta rap music by a woman I had never heard of, Aisha Sekhmet. Aisha Sekhmet was spittin fire and one of the hardest women I had ever heard in terms of the message that she was promoting. The only person that I would compare her to is Oakland’s Askari X. She captured my ear because of her boldness, her passion, as well as her intellect. Check out this fiery much needed newcomer to the rap world in her own words …

M.O.I. JR: How did you start rapping? How did you get to the point where you put your music out?

Press TV
March 28, 2011

Libya has accused the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) of terrorizing and killing its civilians as part of attacks against forces loyal to the embattled 68-year-old Libyan ruler Muammar Gaddafi.

“The terror people live in, the fear, the tension is everywhere. And these are civilians who are being terrorized every day,” Reuters quoted Libyan government spokesman Mussa Ibrahim as saying in the capital Tripoli on Sunday.

“We believe the unnecessary continuation of the air strikes is a plan to put the Libyan government in a weak negotiating position. NATO is prepared to kill people, destroy army training camps and army checkpoints and other locations,” he added.

Read entire article

Daniel Bates
Mail Online
March 28, 2011

Shocking new details emerged today of how American soldiers formed a ‘death squad’ to randomly murder Afghan civilians and mutilate their corpses.

An investigation by Rolling Stone magazine details how senior officers failed to stop troops killing Afghans and keeping their body parts as trophies.

In one horrific episode, the magazine claims troops chopped off a dead Afghan boy’s finger and later used it as ‘gambling chip’ in a game of cards.

Read entire article

AFP
March 10, 2011

The UN on Thursday expressed alarm at a huge decline in bee colonies under a multiple onslaught of pests and pollution, urging an international effort to save the pollinators that are vital for food crops.

Much of the decline, ranging up to 85 percent in some areas, is taking place in the industralised northern hemisphere due to more than a dozen factors, according to a report by the UN’s environmental agency.

They include pesticides, air pollution, a lethal parasite that only affects bee species in the northern hemisphere, mismanagement of the countryside, the loss of flowering plants and a decline in beekeepers in Europe.

Read full article

With the madness going on in Japan and now Libya many of us have forgotten that neighboring Haiti is still in shambles.  First there’s an election run off for President. The last election was marred with accusations of fraud which resulted in widespread violence. The emerging candidates is Wyclef Jean‘s former rival Michel Martelly, 50, is a singer and entertainer known to his fans as “Sweet Micky“. He’s running against a 70 year old former first lady Mirlande Manigat.

Second, the election has become even more complicated because former president Jean-Bertrand Aristide returned to Haiti over the weekend after a 7 year exile. Why is this important? Because it marks the return of man who headed Haiti’s largest political party the Lavalas. That party has not been allowed to partake in Haiti elections primarily because they were not deemed favorable by US corporations and then George W Bush when help orchestrate a coup in 2004 which resulted in Aristide being ousted.

Folks should know Aristide was seen as a President who supported the poor and wanted to raise minimum wage. Sadly this

Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and his family have amassed a fortune estimated at $70 billion according to analysis by Middle East experts poll by the London Guardian. And very little of that stash is kept in his own country, they say. Much of his wealth is in British and Swiss banks or tied up in real estate in London, New York, Los Angeles and along expensive tracts of the Red Sea coast.