By Any Means Necessary Volume 2, Issues 1 & 2

BAMN WE are all We've ever had.

Coronavirus is a Symptom of Genocide If Colonialism is the Disease, Self-Determination is the Cure!

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By Any Means Necessary

TABLE OF CONTENTS: Section 1 - Updates from Chapters Jackson Update - MS Prison Reform Coalition Section 2 - International Interview with Azadeh Shahshahani - Nyeusi Jami Section 3 - Political Prisoners & Prisoners of War Kamau Sadiki - Nyeusi Jami Leonard Peltier - Nyeusi Jami Reverend Joy Powell - Edward Onaci Section 4 - Culture Transformation Requires Us To See Ourselves Through A Lens of Liberatory Justice -Kwame -Osagyefo Kalimara Essays from an Iya - “Finding Destiny: Politics, Ancestors & Magic” - Ifetayo M. Flannery The Unknown Soldier - Karega Ani Your Birth Contract Is Part of African People - Kwame -Osagyefo Kalimara Assata, Nehanda, Queen Mother, You - Mshairi Siyanda We - Mshairi Siyanda Section 6 - Notes on Revolutionary Theory & Practice WE are all We've ever had. - New Afrikan People’s Organization and Malcolm X Grassroots Movement

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Section 1 - Updates from Chapters Jackson Update - MS Prison Reform Coalition

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Section 2 - International Interview with Azadeh Shahshahani Nyeusi Jami The following interview with Azadeh Shahshahani was recorded on January 13, 2020, ten days after the United States assassinated Iranian commander Major General Qassem Soleimani at the Baghdad International Airport. Azadeh is the Legal and Advocacy Director at Project South. She studied Modern Middle Eastern and North African Studies at the University of Michigan and she was born in Tehran, Iran. In the interview Azadeh gives some of the context behind the U.S. empire’s tension with Iran. The interview took place on the R.A.P. (Revolutionary African Perspectives) radio show in Atlanta, GA where Nyeusi Jami is co-host and co-producer.

The Malcolm X Grassroots Movement opposes United States militarism and imperialism. When the U.S. empire invaded Iraq, it was Black soldiers on the front line fighting that war. If an invasion of Iran were to happen, it would be us on the front line again, and even more of us.

Also, the sophisticated weapons and tanks used in invading Iraq are the exact same weapons that were later given to police departments in this country for them to use to terrorize our Black communities. The empire’s international efforts to exploit other nations have everything to do with us here in the belly of the beast.

Photo Credit: Project South

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R.A.P.: We can’t begin a discussion about the U.S. and Iran without going back at least to 1953 and the coup there. What should people in the U.S. understand about what happened at that time?

Azadeh: I can tell you my life for sure and I think the lives of probably every single Iranian have been affected in a very negative way by U.S. imperialism. Just going back to 1953, the U.S. and the UK engineered a coup to topple the democratically elected prime minister of Iran, Mohammad Mosaddegh. He wanted to nationalize Iranian oil, which is obviously considered a crime by the world powers, because they think they should have control over the resources of the global South. So they got rid of him in that coup and brought the Shah back. That definitely changed the course of recent Iranian history in a way that really impacted all of our lives. And then that wasn’t the only instance of U.S. intervention in Iran unfortunately.

Shortly after the revolution​,​ Iran got dragged into the 8-year Iran/Iraq War. Saddam Hussein, the dictator who was ruling over Iraq at the time, invaded Iran thinking that he could probably get rid of the Iranian government very quickly and take over. Of course, that was a very long and bloody war and a combined million people on both sides lost their lives. And the U.S. at that time was actively supporting Saddam.

Again, all of us who lived in Iran at that time were deeply affected by that war. From the age of 1 until the age of 9 that was my life. And yet I wasn’t living in the south. The people who lived in the south of Iran were made refugees or internally displaced people. They had to move up north because their entire towns were destroyed thanks to Saddam. And even those of us living in Tehran, the capitol, had to deal with Tehran being missile bombed on a daily basis during the last year of war. I remember that very clearly. We had to move out of Tehran.

So of course later on Saddam became the evil guy because he wasn’t towing the U.S. line anymore and so then the U.S. planned an invasion of Iraq in 2003 which devastated Iraq.

In 1988 a U.S. warship targeted a civilian Iranian plane, and that led to the death of everyone on that plane, including 66 children. And of course the following year the U.S. government awarded the guy who was leading the charge and never really acknowledged and apologized for this crime. So that’s a quick snapshot of the history. Of course in more recent times we have had sanctions which are currently having a big impact, effecting people’s lives in a horrible way to the point that people are being deprived access to basic medicine and as a result there have been deaths. The Trump regime very recently threatened to bomb Iran and its cultural sites on a daily basis. Trump, Pompeo, and the allied regimes of Saudi Arabia and Israel are trying to interfere in Iran destabilize the situation even further.

People in the U.S. should step back and ask ourselves the question, “why should the U.S. have military bases all over the world?” What are the connections between U.S. imperialism, 6

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militarism, capitalism, and racism? You know, I have been on social media mainly to post myself, I wasn’t paying much attention to other people’s posts. I just learned the extent of the really racist posts shared about “let’s go nuke them,” “let’s go wipe out the entire country,” “let’s go kidnap their women and bring them back.” It’s just misogyny mixed with racism and imperialism. The whole mix is toxic, and we just need to abolish it all.

R.A.P.: It is amazing what the U.S. media can get people to believe about other people. So a lot of this recent discussion in the past year or two has been about Iran’s nuclear program. Is there any reason to believe that Iran wants to develop nuclear weapons or has in the past?

Photo Credit:​shiitenews.org

Azadeh: I can’t comment on the nuclear weapons and what Iran’s plans are. I can tell you for sure that Israel has plenty of nuclear weapons. Nobody is criticizing them for that. Iran has a right to develop nuclear energy. There was a deal that was reached during the Obama administration after many years of negotiation and compromises. Trump made a campaign promise to get rid of the deal and he did. So what was reached through diplomacy was just wiped out. So we have had provocation after provocation since Trump came to power. Not to say that things were perfect during Obama, obviously they weren’t because we still had sanctions. But the situation in the past three years has been devastating and getting worse by the day. This administration has a very clear agenda in mind.

R.A.P.: Human Rights Attorney Dan Kovalik author of the book “The Plot To Attack Iran” said in an interview that the Ayatollah issued a fatwa that prohibited the use of nuclear weapons because it goes against Islam. Is that true?

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Azadeh: I believe so. I think one thing for people to be aware of, going to the larger issue of U.S. militarism and imperialism, there is this notion that is very much rooted in white supremacy and racism, that it’s ok for the U.S. government to go around the world and build military bases and surround countries in the global south with their military bases. And they can just decide to kill people and assassinate people and torture people as they wish. The assassination that started the chain reaction in the past two weeks was completely illegal. It was an act of terror committed by the U.S. government and universally condemned, except by U.S. and Israel of course. And so the U.S. government as the world power can bend the laws as they wish and this is all in the service of U.S. militarism and racism.

R.A.P.: Would it be accurate to say that the cardinal sin of Iran is that the U.S. wants to dominate the whole region through Saudi Arabia and Israel and Iran is the biggest thing standing in the way of that?

Azadeh: I think that’s very much true. And I think there are changes that are needed in Iran, but any change coming in Iran has to come from the people, as is true anywhere else in the world. I am very much in support of the people’s movements in Iran which are very vibrant, movements for labor and students and women. The statements coming from people’s movements are that they are against imperialism, they are against foreign intervention, and they are against the crimes of the regimes. We can’t whitewash that. We have to look at the whole picture.

We have to give support and solidarity to the people especially the working class, the students, and the women who are leading grassroots movements at the same time as we absolutely condemn U.S. imperialism and any type of foreign intervention attempts at destabilization, murder, and the sanctions that are killing people.

-----You can read more from Azadeh on this topic at: https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/voices/2018/09/26/iran-united-states-foreign-policy-iraq-war-column /1379872002/​ http://inthesetimes.com/article/21846/war-militarism-imperialism-invasion-iraq-syria-afghanistan-isis-troops​

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Section 3 - Political Prisoners & Prisoners of War ​

Kamau Sadiki ​Nyeusi Jami

​Kamau and his daughter, ​Ksisay Torres Photo Credit:​jerichony.org

Kamau Sadiki, who was born under the name Freddie Hilton, is a humanitarian and a devoted father. In 1969, at the age of 17, he joined the Jamaica, Queens branch of the Black Panther Party. He spent his days working in the Free Breakfast Program, and he spent his evenings selling the Black Panther newspaper, doing organizing work for tenants with slumlords, and attending political education classes.

In 1971, he joined the underground component of the Black Liberation Movement. In October 1973, he was captured and indicted in connection with an alleged Bronx bank robbery from September 1972. One of the other people on trial for this was Assata Shakur. Assata and Kamau refused to go along with the charade of a trial and they spent the long days of court proceedings locked up in a room adjacent to the courtroom, by order of the judge. During this process, they fell in love and conceived a child, Kamau’s second daughter.

Kamau was held in captivity for five years during the 1970s. After he got out on parole, he legally changed his name to Kamau Sadiki, got a job, and put his entire focus on supporting his family and practicing his Muslim faith. He was out of the public eye until he got arrested in 2002. Kamau was accused of murdering Atlanta Police Officer James Green on November 3, 1971.

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The Black Liberation Army unit that Kamau was a part of left New York City in 1971 and spent some time in Atlanta. Two witnesses observed three Black males running from a van where Officer Green was shot in downtown Atlanta. Those witnesses failed to identify Kamau from a photographic lineup. There was no physical evidence connecting Kamau to the killing, as he wasn’t there. The case was closed.

30 years later, the so-called law enforcement community decided they wanted to turn up the pressure on recapturing Assata Shakur since she had been liberated from prison in 1979. As they were looking into the people closest to her, they found that Kamau, the father of her daughter, was dealing with complications from Hepatitis C and sarcoidosis. They apprehended him and told him that he would die in prison if he didn’t help them lure Assata away from Cuba to a place where they could capture her. He refused their request, and they proceeded to convict him on a thirty-year-old murder charge with no evidence.

Since November 2003, Kamau Sadiki has been held at the Augusta State Medical Prison in Augusta, GA. The prison officials have been hoping that they can be negligent enough in his medical care that he will die in prison ever since then. In November 2018, they threatened to amputate his foot rather than have him seen by a wound care specialist who could properly care for his feet. Organized community pressure was able to stop them from doing so. However, he is still behind bars and still ill.

18 years in prison has been 18 years too many for this innocent family man. We need Kamau Sadiki’s freedom now!

You can send greetings and support to Kamau at: Mr. Freddie Hilton, a/k/a Kamau Sadiki #0001150688 Augusta State Medical Prison 3001 Gordon Highway Grovetown, GA 30813

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Leonard Peltier ​

Nyeusi Jami

Leonard Peltier (of the Anishinabe, Dakota, and Lakota Nations) dedicated his life to fighting for the freedom and dignity of his people at the age of 14, in 1959. He lived on the Turtle Mountain Chippewa reservation in North Dakota. At that time, a resolution was passed in Congress to “terminate” all Indian reservations and “relocate” Indians to major cities. Later court decisions declared that policy illegal, however the government cut back their previous support of the reservations in an attempt to starve the people into complying with the policy anyway. Leonard decided that he would commit his life to ending the suffering of his people.

Photo Credit: ​solidarity-us.org

He became adept at the spiritual practices of his people as well as the practice of communal self-defense. In 1970 he participated in the peaceful takeover of Fort Lawton, outside Seattle, Washington, which was on “surplus” federal land to which the Indians had first right under the law. Leonard and his fellow occupiers were brutally beaten and arrested but their action was successful. Today Fort Lawton is an Indian cultural center. After that victory, Leonard joined the

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American Indian Movement (AIM), an Indigenous rights movement committed to uniting all Native Peoples in an effort to uplift their communities and promote cultural pride and sovereignty.

In the fall of 1972, Leonard Peltier participated in the Trail of Broken Treaties March in Washington, DC which presented the federal government with a 20-point proposal for improving U.S.-Indian relations. The proposal demanded the restoration of their constitutional treaty-making powers and recognition of the sovereignty of Indian nations. That march was also met with violence by the forces of the state.

A few weeks later, Peltier was falsely accused of the attempted murder of a Milwaukee, Wisconsin police officer. He spent five months in jail before AIM was able to raise his bail.

Recognizing that there was no way for him to receive a fair trial, he went underground. He spent the next two years traveling to various Indian reservations, participating in direct actions, spiritual ceremonies, and leading security teams.

Starting in 1973, the people at Pine Ridge reservation in South Dakota were victims of ongoing violence from agents of the state as well as a group of Indian vigilantes. In June 1975, Leonard and other AIM members went to Pine Ridge to protect the people and provide various kinds of community service. On June 26, 1975, there was a shootout between the people and the FBI, leaving two FBI agents and one Indian dead.

Leonard Peltier was arrested in Canada on February 6, 1976, along with Frank Blackhorse, a.k.a.

Frank Deluca. The United States presented the Canadian court with affidavits signed by Myrtle Poor Bear who said she was Mr. Peltier’s girlfriend and allegedly saw him shoot the agents. In fact, Ms. Poor Bear had never met Mr. Peltier and was not present during the shootout. Soon after, Ms. Poor Bear recanted her statements and said the FBI threatened her and coerced her into signing the affidavits.

A trial was held in North Dakota in 1977 consisting of the usual mix of lies and constitutional rights violations that are typical when our freedom fighters are confronted by the state. Leonard has spent much of the past 44 years held in solitary confinement in federal prisons. All legal appeals against his conviction have been exhausted. His most recent petition for release on parole was denied in 2009; he will not be eligible for parole again until 2024, when he will be 79 years old.

He has received much support from around the world with people demanding his release. There was a well-organized effort to get President Barack Obama to grant Leonard clemency before he

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left the White House, but Obama chose not to grant that request. More information about Leonard is available at ​www.whoisleonardpeltier.info Cards and letters can be sent to: Leonard Peltier #89637-132 USP Coleman I PO Box 1033 Coleman, FL 33521

Reverend Joy Powell Edward Onaci

The Reverend Joy Powell is an anti-violence activist and a voice of the people in Rochester, New York. After serving time in the early 1990s for selling drugs in her community, she realized that she needed to help her people. She became a professional hair stylist and began to fight against violence, the drug trade, and poor living conditions. As she carried out this important work, she also became a pastor.

In the early 2000s, Reverend Powell became the target of Rochester police harassment. This was due to her willingness to challenge police brutality and the “justified” killing of Black people in mental crisis. As a known critic of how police handled people with known mental illness, Rev. Powell was soon arrested on charges of burglary and assault. During her trial, the judge restricted her speech, refusing to let her discuss her ministry or her activism. She was convicted of the charges by an all-white jury in 2007.

Reverend Powell needs us to take action now. She has been placed in solitary confinement after filing several complaints for sexual harassment, religious and racial discrimination, and mishandling of her mail and property. According to ​her website​, she has also been refused medical treatment for asthma and diabetes.

Let the New York State Department of Corrections know that you do not condone their treatment of Reverend Powell by writing to them. Contact: Sabina Kaplan, Superintendent

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Bedford Hills Correctional Facility 247 Harris Rd Bedford Hills, NY 10507 Acting Commissioner Anthony J. Annucci NYS Department of Corrections Harriman State Campus 1220 Washington Avenue, Bldg. 2 Room 315 Albany, New York 12226 (518) 457-8134 Rev. Powell also appreciates hearing from people directly. Write to her at: Reverend Joy Powell 07G0632 Bedford Hills Correctional Facility P.O. Box 1000 Bedford Hills, NY 10507-2499

Photo Credit: ​freejoypowell.org

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Section 4 - Culture Transformation Requires Us To See Ourselves Through A Lens of Liberatory Justice Kwame-Osagyefo Kalimara

Photo Credit: Lawrence Hill Publication

Transformation requires us to see ourselves through a lens of liberatory justice.

It means that we apply a new discipline which is holistic, mind-body-spirit, integrating a political and cultural value in our work to rehabilitate ourselves, our family, our community, our New Afrikan nation, and indeed the world.

Our ancestors speak and direct if we listen.

Listen and celebrate their teachings.

Be bold, live the best of who we are and they were.

Courage is moving forward in spite of whatever apprehensions we may have.

We are One.

Ancestral blessings.

Free the Land!!!

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Series - ​Essays from an Iya “Finding Destiny: Politics, Ancestors & Magic” Ifetayo M. Flannery, Ph.D MXGM Oakland Chapter I almost forget now the moment my Spirit had become idle. I know it was some time when I was coming of age in college. I did not become numb to the virtue of spirituality nor did I decide to become agnostic. But I was aggressively aware as time passed that my former belief system and my fever for Black politics were nonaligned. I had never been someone to ignore the truth in efforts to hold on to tradition for tradition sake; and so as destiny would unfold, the totality of my being would evolve as I fell in love with Black Studies. My consciousness was hungry for more answers in every class I accumulated and the necessary “revolution” was my solitaire logical conclusion for various narratives in the New Afrikan experience. I had not sorted out what to do about religion and at the time I wasn’t empty enough to figure it out. The revolution had saved my life—thank God. As my depth of study into the African and African diasporic experience stretched in my graduate studies, I peeled away other layers of African epistemology. I could easily make sense of race and DuBois’ double-consciousness; I deeply felt the sociological isolation of Baldwin—but what God was Harriet talking about and how do we explain the immortality of Queen Nanny, and of what significance do we attribute to the rituals of the Haitian Revolution? I could not suffocate these truths of the greatness of our people, but I was not sure I had felt this type of faith in anything before. My curiosity in the unseen reality and mysticism of African people was a gentle seed expanding in my conscious mind. I never really paused to think about what was happening to me reflexively. I was more or less thrust into African spirituality during my studies, however in the right time and place. I remember attending a Vodou ceremony in Philadelphia as an assignment for an African Religion class. I do not know why I wasn’t afraid given the mass propaganda I was exposed to my entire life. Nonetheless, by now I had a good amount of exposure to Black nationalism, cultural nationalism, revolutionary nationalism, Afrocentricity, and a host of other positive feelings towards embracing the known and unknown parts of my New Afrikan self. These politics definitely became the gateway to my spiritual destiny. For some reason the ceremony that night felt familiar and ancient at the same time. It was held at someone’s personal residence only a mile from where I had been living in Philly. I remember the kindness of the elderly Black women and a deep sense of “blackness” being normal and supreme in this setting. It was something I had never experienced personally but the rhythm and the singing voices of the people melted over me like an epic memory. I was never the same after that. The ancestors had whispered in my ear that night, and that was fa sho’ Black magic.

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How many libations had I participated in by now without realizing I had no idea what to do next if the ancestors we called on actually responded? There was no going back. More thinking, more intellectualizing, more emptiness, more desire. I was uncomfortable and eager. I had read about Hoodoo and “roots” on plantations saving people’s lives and being used in resistance movements but it had been very easy to rationalize these realities without thinking of them as living. Before much time had passed, I was invited to participate in what would become my first divination. It was a divination within the IFA tradition of the Yoruba people. As the diviner began to sketch parts of my life from the past and what was to come, I felt totally confident that my ancestors embraced me in victory in that very moment even as I had vaguely acknowledged them for the first twenty-seven years of my life. It felt like I was figuring out who I was for the second time; my encounter with Black Studies was the first. This was another epistemology that could not be completely theorized or intellectualized, nor could it be explained by or explained away by white supremacy, it was unfiltered power. With the ancestors tangibly in one hand and me being in my conscious African mind in the other, all things became aligned.

Knowing who you are and not simply who you wish to be—this is the gift of finding one’s spiritual destiny.

Now that many years have passed, it is hard for me to imagine how I was making decisions about my life without a relationship to anything outside of the material world. Living one dimensionally is like being a mouse in a maze. Likewise, I found that me having been a devout revolutionary, standing on the work of our ancestors but not investigating the ways in which we have traditionally been able to speak directly to them, was like having a gun and not knowing how to shoot it. I engage the ancestors regularly now and with more sacred sensitivity because I know how to hear what they are saying back to me, which comes with a level of moral responsibility. This gift in our culture also comes with the gift of peace of mind and confidence in what is coming. I imagine the stories we have read of the unconscionable bravery of our people was coupled at most times with the confidence of having negotiated with ancestral powers ahead of time. I believe finding your destiny is simply allowing yourself to be revealed to yourself by the divine source. In the olden days and in the current days we call this process “divination.” All African spiritual systems use some form of divination. If we study our own culture long enough it will easily appear. Finding my destiny as a New Afrikan was definitely a process of first encountering myself as an African, and secondly being brave enough to live as an African.

Politics, ancestors, and magic—magic being our free will and grave intentions to act—is an extraordinary combination for unchartered liberation.

Maferefun Olodumare Maferefun Ori Maferefun Orisha Maferefun Egungun, Ase.

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The Unknown Soldier Karega Ani

Karega and Karega Jr Photo Credit: Karega Ani

sometime between the second pregnancy test and the first ultrasound before the impact of your first step and the last breath of yesterday’s headline after your circumcision and a half inch ahead of your castration this process became your inheritance son we are not the same as them i mean the sentiment is cute and all but i’m telling you this to save you from the frustrations i’ve been faced with listen - we are not the same as them your coming of age will arrive and find you grown your education will come in a series of inexplicable traumas heartaches and high beams silences that you will find awkward... for a little while.... before the numbness kicks in... before you finally come to grips with the difference between who you are and who you have to be you will learn to disappear before they find you... someplace halfway between Elmina and Galveston over the chalk line next to the last time before the next time and the next... and the next… and 18

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the next… you will become a threat son you better stop crying you won’t like the places that the rivers will take you and no it doesn’t matter why you feel the way you do it will never ever matter why you feel the way you do if you want to survive you’d better stop feeling the way you do you still crying i said stop crying we’ve never had the luxury of being vulnerable in public you gotta pull yourself together ain’t nobody got the time to wipe your tears somewhere hidden in the pretenses bubbling up from the abysmal narratives collecting dust beneath the rickety staircases you’ll find the expectations the blaring stereotypes the penalties for being anything besides an effigy of life eventually you will find identity in the empty spaces and suspicious whispers eventually you will find a home in the monotonous rage you will learn to love to wear it as a second skin and you will fight any and everything except the inevitability eventually you will accept the inevitability eventually your weeping will be swallowed by the liquor bottles and screaming silences and self-deprecation and emptiness you will see that our feelings became a dead language when our Gods sank somewhere in the middle of the Atlantic inevitably invariably you will be lost in translation viewed through thin blue lines and bank statements and rifle scopes and preconceived notions that always end in your extermination pay attention we ain’t got no mo’ time to waste on this emotional shit we age in dog years and you 6 years old now lil’ nigga it’s over baby don’t nobody think you priceless anymore innocence is a luxury we can’t afford i said get over it stop crying God damn it i’m trying to protect you to prepare you for the antagonism that it is to be a nigga get a clue this is your education trade in your daydreams for blank faces and pragmatism our humanity is a revolution that ain’t had a chance to happen as of yet so shut yo little bitch ass up… before they hear you... someday behind the ice grills and the iron gates in the middle of the regimented fields and the genetic memories in the crimson tinted hands of king cotton and sugarcane bitterness in the midst of the oral and urban decay you will discover the muted desperation of being incomplete we are still searching for our missing pieces our other 2 fifths the fraction that would make us something other than expendable the fraction in which they hid our grins and convinced us we didn’t need them and convinced us we didn’t need each other and convinced us we didn’t need anyone ‘cause it’s better to be feared than loved leaving us feeling alone in crowded rooms and street corners and prison yards and contemplations and relationships perpetuating the cycle generation after generation beating the sweetness out of our babies ‘til they stop crying - i said stop crying fix your face this is your education no time no need to keep pretending you can be like them no time no need for existential considerations at the end of the day we have to survive even if we have to give our lives to do it ----------------------Selection from the recently published book ​My Big Black Audacity: Poems by Karega Ani

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Assata, Nehanda, Queen Mother, You! ​ Mshairi Siyanda She saves Gracefully slay fear Courage pushing her shoulders back Head up digits of her foremothers Wrapped around each vertebrate Of her spine Wrapped around her spine Wrapped around her spine The sun passing bolts of energy for nourishment She takes a piece and passes it on And on Weaving her blood Sewing love into her Loved ones Strangers even Needle be a string of hair Plucked from her head Iron made Her tears nourish the soil For unborn babies to reap The harvest She fresh Make ya smile and frown At the same time fresh Finger Snapping Can't help but to compliment her Fresh

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Breath like music Conjuring with a glaze of her eye Rage is gentle enough To destroy all ill intentions Seasoning her food with Salt grains plucked from galaxies Putting her foot in it Hips and ankles too She be Earth's muse Society's dessert Standing up strong After pregnant bellies Buried in the dirt With slashed wounds On her back blood, bone and dirt exposed Standing stronger After being exposed as the world's Most hated and adored commodity Standing stronger After feeding black, brown, white, yellow From her breast No rest Aching nipple Drinking river water She keep going Standing Stronger Even when weak wins the round She making plans To get back up with her chest pressed again the ground Shapeshifting and gripping Trees with her bare hands To power up Memories sprinkled in the dust

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Once her flesh God made her in her image Once her flesh Told ya she was fresh blue aura around her frame Adorned by corals From the deep and dark Depths of the ocean Deeper than than Healing strokes from her finger tips Cured by her care Lover and saver of the foolish Forgave them enough times then again Clear onyx charger of free beings No holds on her spirit Try breathing without her Do it...

Imagine a world with her Do it...

Try to speak words Walk, listen, feel without her Do it...

Impossible never hurt so bad

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We ​ ​Mshairi Siyanda We offer our lungs When you can't breathe We extend our hands When yours aren't free We offer security When your door has been broken down We offer our voices When yours can't make a sound We shield your body From being the primary taget We poor libation and say your name so our youth will never forget We circle you with protection When others claim to protect their own We gather in your name When you are physically gone We activate collectively When you are behind the walls We stand strong together So that it's never an option to fall For our soldiers Our comrades Our courageous activist We salute you with hard work Forward movement And raised fists

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Your Birth Contract Is Part of African People Kwame-Osagyefo Kalimara

Photo Credit: Dr Sunny Sandhu at www.atelierom.guru

Your birth contract is part of Afrikan people's liberation.

In our mirror we see images of being Afrikan or not.

Choice must be deliberate!

Photo Credit: ​azquotes.com

Continue to teach those lessons to our children, our destiny as a people resides in their acceptance - agency.

Revolution is our birth right, ancestral legacy.

Dare to struggle, dare to win.

Ancestral blessings. Free the Land!!

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Section 6 - Notes on Revolutionary Theory & Practice ​New

Afrikan People’s Organizatio​n Malcolm X Grassroots Movement

WE are all We've ever had.

Coronavirus is a Symptom of Genocide If Colonialism is the Disease, Self-Determination is the Cure!

The Black Nation in the United States is dying from the COVID-19 pandemic at higher rates in many cities across the U.S. empire. While our enemies and oppressors slander us and claim that our people are dying in such large numbers because we aren’t taking this disease seriously, it is well known that this disease has a heavier impact on people with underlying health issues. Black people are among those who are disproportionately inundated with a wide array of health issues. The masses of our people do not have access to quality health care and are already a large part of the legion of the uninsured, being the 2nd largest population without medical insurance in the empire. We already suffer from higher rates of heart disease, asthma, and diabetes than the “national” average. Once again, so-called racial disparities—our colonial reality under U.S. imperialism— are a manifestation of the systematic genocide our people must contend with.

Photo Credit: https://blackdemographics.com/alarming-new-covid-19-data-shows-african-americans-might-be-affected-athigher-rates/

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We are already deemed economically expendable, with large numbers of our disabled people forced into homelessness and many of us forced into dangerous subsistence living through the underground economy where our attempts to feed our families are arbitrarily criminalized. Murder by law enforcement and vigilantes was already a leading cause of death for us. These health, economic, and punitive disparities are a direct result of our people’s continued colonial relationship to the United States. Because of the deep structure of our colonized state of being, our human right to make decisions in the best interests of our people has been violated time and time again. Thus, thousands of Black lives will be lost to this plague and the aftermath of the social and economic calamity it leaves in its wake.

The U.S. government’s response to this global disaster shows us that they cannot be trusted and that we need to rely on ourselves to survive. The United States has once again proven that they are unfit to make decisions on the behalf of the people they govern. The southern region of the U.S., the region identified as the Black Nation’s national territory, is under the political control of a Neo-Confederacy that utterly dominates every aspect of life for colonized Black people in the region. This same Neo-Confederacy, with its tendency towards fascism, has become the leading faction of the U.S. ruling class and has taken control over the federal government. They have been aggressively rolling back hard-won social movement gains, first in the South and now on the federal level for years. They have dismantled vital government services and institutions for years in the service of neoliberalism. These same Neo-Confederates are poised to use this disaster to further attack our people through unleashing the full force of the domestic military apparatus on us through Martial Law and containment strategies like they did in New Orleans during and after Hurricane Katrina and the Gulf Coast disaster.

Photo Credit: ​The Atlantic

According to The Atlantic’s COVID Tracking Project about one in 10 deaths in the United States from COVID-19 have occurred in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Georgia; with New Orleans, Louisiana on pace to become the next global epicenter of the pandemic.

These are 4 out of the 5 states that have been identified as the national territory of the Black Nation. We need medical resources and testing to be made immediately available to Black people en-masse in a holistic manner that takes into account the full reality of our people’s

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needs. Every sector in our people, from people oppressed because of their gender and sexuality, wage-slaves living pay-check to paycheck, disabled people, hair dressers, people robbed of their human right to housing and forced to sleep in squalor on the streets, sex-workers, incarcerated people, etc. has very specific health needs created by the particular ways national oppression manifests amongst Black people colonized under U.S. Imperialism. The North American settler nation ignores these health disparities to their peril. Their lack of focus and attention to those most impacted and vulnerable to this pandemic will cause a large amount of their own population to become affected and die from the disease too. While their healthcare system discriminates, the coronavirus does not. The Black nation must defend itself; and we call on those who resist this imperialist settler-colonial empire to stand with us through centering the needs of those amongst our people who are dying from COVID19 and imperial neglect.

Our people make up 13.4% of the general U.S. population and 40% of the U.S. prison population, the largest prison population by percentage in the world (making Black people in the United States the most heavily incarcerated nation on the planet). Of the 48,000 incarcerated youth in the United States, ​42% of boys and 35% of girls in juvenile facilities are Black. ​The empire's jails and prisons are already known to be places riddled disease with imprisoned people who suffer from medical neglect and torture. COVID-19 is already starting to take the lives of our people languishing in the jails. Amongst these prisoners are our many Political Prisoners and Prisoners of War, including Dr. Mutulu Shakur a freedom fighter and acupuncturist and founder of our organization who is being illegally held in prison years past his mandated release date. Dr. Shakur currently suffers from bone cancer which makes him not only a member of the population of people highly vulnerable to COVID-19 but also eligible for compassionate release.

Any measures taken to address this health crisis needs to also take into account the impact of the economic devastation that is a result of the fallout from this pandemic; with 195 million jobs projected to be wiped out worldwide leaving 2 billion people or 61% of the global workforce in need of some form of economic assistance to survive. People who have had their right to housing violated, people being released from jails and prisons, and people who are attempting to flee domestic abuse need to have housing made available immediately in order to both slow the spread of the pandemic and to uphold their human dignity. Rent and eviction moratoriums need to be put into place across the empire. It is not enough to provide housing and rent relief on a temporary basis. This housing and rent relief needs to be made permanent and federal resources extracted from the taxes people pay in this country need to be used for the immediate benefit of everyone residing in the country. Our people have the right to do whatever they need to survive. Our people’s survival is not a crime. Nations who have economic sanctions and blockades imposed on them when the entire world is fighting this pandemic. Oftentimes these nations, especially Cuba through its Socialist Revolution, have stepped up to provide critical medical resources and expertise in an exemplary display of international solidarity and joint struggle to countries who have been ravaged by the coronavirus. We stand with the grassroots people of Venezuela and Iran and see a commonality of struggle with them as they

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fight for access to medicine necessary to their survival that they cannot attain access to because of U.S. embargoes. We join the freedom loving people of the world in condemning the United States’ continued illegal attempts at regime change in Venezuela. We also unequivocally oppose military aggression from the United States against the people of Iran. All forms of economic warfare during a global pandemic are acts of genocide and crimes against humanity. We support the right of self-determination for all nations and demand that the same right be respected and upheld for our people.

Photo Credit:​Protest in Barcelona on 1 October 2018 CC BY-SA 2.0

We need to acknowledge and prepare ourselves for the sobering reality that things will never be the same after this crisis; and they shouldn't be. The impact of this disease and the collapse of the global economy will be felt for decades to come. This is a defining moment that will shape the history of the 21st century. The oppressive conditions that created the situation the world now suffers the consequences of, must be condemned. We reject any and all attempts to return to business as usual. The previous neo-liberal economic and political order the nations of the world have been subjected to for decades has been discredited and proven to be a failure. It is time for ​a new path forward. A world where the people of the world enjoy direct democracy not only in state sponsored elections, but at the workplace itself; a world where the right of everyday people to make decisions in their own interests is supported through the work of their own hands and ingenuity. We can do better and we deserve better. No one is coming to save us. As always, the only things we can trust are the ability of the people to do for themselves, their valor, and the creativity that has made Africans the most imitated people in the world.

​Photo Credit: Cuban doctors arrive in Italy to help fight COVID-19. Matteo Bazzi/EPA 28

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It is our duty to join an organization dedicated towards the liberation of our people. It is our duty to stand on the legacy of our ancestors and move our centuries long national liberation struggle forward. We have survived and we will continue to do so, BY ANY MEANS NECESSARY! Free The Land!

Malcolm X Grassroots Movement

WE are all We've ever had.

Coronavirus is a Symptom of Genocide If Colonialism is the Disease, Self-Determination is the Cure!

Despite the ​deadly impact​ and worldwide social crisis caused by this global public health pandemic the world is experiencing, this moment invites us to heed the call to action. As stated and contextualized above, the movement, Black people, and those who demand that humanity must not go back to business as usual must answer this call. answered by. Kazi (work) is needed at this moment. It must center the lived experiences of Black communities and other most vulnerable communities across the empire and throughout the globe who receive little or inadequate access to medical resources. We support all formations and collectives from those disproportionately affected communities who have committed themselves to this struggle and who demand center vulnerable communities, the workers, and human dignity, while opposing imperial colonial genocidal responses to COVID19 and the economic fallouts in its aftermath..

We list examples of immediate needs that should be addressed and offer strategic kazi areas requiring action below. ​Malcolm X Grassroots Movement provides these kazi areas to align movements of resistance towards a unified set of demands for a Just response to this pandemic and social catastrophe for frontline communities.

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COVID 19 Action Items (Kazi) 1. Track the racial and ethnic demographic Impact Data of COVID19​ regarding loss of 2.

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life, loss of jobs and fines, fees, and arrest at the city, state, and national levels.

Demand NO Experimental Testing on Africans in the United States or abroad.​ We reject the longtime practice of experimenting on our people. We are very concerned about experimental vaccinations proposed to be tested on our people in Detroit, in the prisons, and on the African continent.

End Sanctions and Blockades against sovereign nations.​ During this time governments should have open access to all resources necessary to meet the needs of their people.

Make Housing Accessible Immediately.​ Unused and surplus housing, including hotels and motels should be made immediately available to people without housing Create an Immediate Release System​ for incarcerated youth, elders, and those with compromised immune systems.

Support Parole and Demand Compassionate​ Release for Dr. Mutulu Shakur​ ​, ​Mumia Abu-Jamal and other political prisoners.

Decarcerate in the Name of Public Health.​ Call Mississippi Governor Tate Reeves at (601) 359-3150 to demand that the Mississippi Department of Corrections decarcerate in the name of public health!

Invest in Self Determination Defense Models for Community Resilience.​ ​ We must build a movement that cares for our people, materially, socially, and protects communities. ​Communities’ rapid response to this pandemic have created mutual aid for collective resources. We also should engage in participatory democracy, such as peoples assemblies to create collective democratic decision-making responses to this crisis . a. Mutual Aid b. People's Assemblies c. Community Self Defense Networks Sources​:

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https://blackdemographics.com/alarming-new-covid-19-data-shows-african-americans-might-be-affected-at-higher-rates/ https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2020/04/coronavirus-unique-threat-south-young-people/609241/?fbclid=IwAR2 GiwOBsw4ZiQ7M_izxxKTgPJpWc5Ghg4t4_fcOKwUNut-6Q24V9UWaZ7A https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/07/covid-19-expected-to-to-wipe-out-67-of-worlds-working-hours https://www.kff.org/disparities-policy/fact-sheet/health-coverage-for-the-black-population-today-and-under-the-affordable-car e-act/ https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/rates.html http://mutulushakur.com/site/2019/12/medical-legal-update/ https://www.democracynow.org/2020/3/24/cuba_medical_diplomacy_italy_coronavirus

By Any Means Necessary

BY ANY MEANS NECESSARY BAMN Staff: ​Makungu Akinyela Noel Didla Maria Fernandez Ifetayo Flannery Nyeusi Jami Edward Onaci Kwame-Osagyefo Kalimara Akinyele Umoja ​Contributors: Karega Ani M ​ shairi Siyanda

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