Uhuru Movement

The Uhuru Movement (Uhuru is the Swahili word for "freedom")[1] is a socialist and black nationalist movement founded in 1972 and led by the African People's Socialist Party (APSP),[2] whose chairman is Omali Yeshitela. It is centered on the theory of African Internationalism, which it says provides a historical materialist explanation for the social and economic conditions of African people worldwide.

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The APSP has formed several organizations, each with specific tasks and purpose. Affiliated organizations include The International People's Democratic Uhuru Movement (InPDUM), African Socialist International (ASI), UhuruNews.com, African People's Solidarity Committee (APSC), Uhuru Solidarity Movement (USM), Burning Spear Productions, Uhuru Foods, Uhuru Furniture,[3] All African People's Development and Empowerment Project (AAPDEP), and African People's Education and Defense Foundation (APEDF).[4]

Political views and history

The Uhuru Movement's political ideology is African Internationalism, which states that capitalism was born parasitic through the attack on Africa and its people.[5] African Internationalism holds that capitalism is imperialism developed to its highest stage,[6] not the other way around, as theorized by Vladimir Lenin.[7]

This belief derives from Karl Marx's 1867 book Capital, in which Marx wrote of the condition essential to the emergence of capitalism which he called the "primitive accumulation" of capital.[6] African Internationalism is not a static theory that only refers to past conditions, it refers also to the conditions that African people are faced with today. It refers to African people who live inside what it views as imperialist centers, such as the United States and Europe, as an "internal colony".[5] The Movement has called for the release of all African American prisoners in U.S. prisons, described as "concentration camps", and has described U.S. police forces as an "illegitimate standing army". They have called for the withdrawal of police forces from exploited and oppressed African American communities.[8]

In the 1990s, tensions between the police in St. Petersburg, Florida and the Uhuru Movement were high. Members of the Uhuru Movement frequently protested against the police's treatment of African Americans, usually after the murders of African Americans by police. On October 25, 1996, violence erupted after a white police officer shot and killed a young black man driving a stolen car.[9] Cars and buildings were torched, protestors shouted, and rocks, along with other items, were tossed at the police officers at the scene of the shooting. At least 20 protestors were arrested. The next day, a large group of Uhuru members went back to the scene and called for the release of the arrested protestors. Sobukwe Bambaata, one of the Uhuru members, stated that the rioting would have never occurred "if the police did not come into our community and treat us like dogs."[10]

Although violence broke out in 1996, most of the protests organized by the movement remained peaceful.[11][12]

Areas of work

The Uhuru Movement is a collective of organizations and institutions that were formed by the African People's Socialist Party. Each organization was created to deal with specific issues related to the conditions faced by African people under colonialism:

Political Organizations
  • The African People's Socialist Party is an African-only political party. Its leading body is the National Central Committee (NCC) which makes up the leadership of the Uhuru Movement.
  • The African Socialist International is the international manifestation of the African People's Socialist Party. Its job is to build Party organizations around the world and network with other revolutionary African organizations who unite with the principles of the African People's Socialist Party. Party members and institutions have been created in several European countries, the Caribbean and South America.
  • International People's Democratic Uhuru Movement (InPDUM) "is the leading mass organization in the struggle for Bread, Peace and Black Power in the 21st Century." [13] Now located in three continents around the world, INPDUM has always demanded reparations, state power and self-government for African people worldwide!
  • African National Women's Organization (ANWO) is the leading mass organization for African women who struggle against the colonial conditions that remove them from political life.

Community Organizations
  • All African People's Development and Empowerment Project (AAPDEP) is an international organization establishing development projects in African communities worldwide. Its main work is in the areas of agriculture, education and healthcare. It recently completed a project to help Ebola survivors in Sierra Leone.
  • African People's Education and Defense Fund (APEDF) strives to develop and institutionalize programs to defend the human and civil rights of the African community, and to address the grave disparities in education, health, healthcare, and economic development faced by the African community.

Solidarity (non-African) Political Organizations
  • African People Solidarity Committee (APSC) was founded in 1976 by the African People's Socialist Party (APSP) as a way for Euro-American and European (white) people to join the African liberation struggle, working directly under the leadership of the APSP.
  • Uhuru Solidarity Movement (USM) is an organization of white people created by and working directly under the leadership of the African People's Socialist Party.

Economic Institutions
  • The Black Power Blueprint in St Louis, MO is a Black Community Economic Development project led by and for the Black working class in St Louis and Ferguson. It is a project of APEDF. It will result in a new Uhuru House African cultural center, One Africa, One Nation Marketplace, a community garden, and Uhuru Jiko Community Commercial Kitchen & Bakery Cafe and home of the Africans Independence Workforce Program.
  • Uhuru Furniture Philadelphia represents people in Philadelphia who donate, shop and/or volunteer at the Uhuru Movement's second-hand furniture store in that city.
  • Uhuru Furniture Oakland represents people in Oakland who donate, shop and/or volunteer at the Uhuru Movement's second-hand furniture store in that city.
  • Uhuru Foods and Pies' mission is to produce and sell the freshest foods to build self-sustaining economic development, designed for the prosperity and self-determination of present and future generations of African people worldwide.
  • Akwaaba Hall in Oakland, St. Louis, and St. Petersburg are located event rental spaces offered at a low cost to the community.
  • The Burning Spear Newspaper is the Uhuru Movement's newspaper. They call it "the voice of the international African Revolution."

Media

Controversies and criticisms

In 2004, Uhuru Movement's leader Omali Yeshitela tore down a Halloween display in St. Petersburg which depicted "a stuffed figure hung by the neck on a homemade gallows". Subsequent opinions[14] and letters[15] to the St. Petersburg Times regarding the incident were critical of both the Uhuru Movement and Yeshitela's conduct.[15]

The Uhuru Movement came to national attention during the 2008 Presidential campaign season when they interrupted Barack Obama at a town hall meeting in St. Petersburg, Florida, and questioned the candidate with the question, "What about the black community?"[16] alleging that he was not speaking out for Africans on issues such as police brutality, high unemployment, predatory lending, and Hurricane Katrina.[17]

The group was criticized by the Anti-Defamation League for engaging in demonstrations on January 3, 2009 in St. Petersburg, Florida which the ADL claims encouraged anti-Israel and anti-Zionist rallies.[18]

In 2009, the International People's Democratic Uhuru Movement organized a march in support of Lovelle Mixon and against the Oakland Police. Mixon, an Oakland, California resident, had been accused of killing four Oakland police officers and died during a shootout after a traffic stop, coincidentally just blocks away from the local Uhuru headquarters.[19][20] On the other hand, many black Oaklanders, as well as those belonging to other racial groups, seemed largely opposed to such sentiments,[21] a clear majority of those who regularly campaign against abuses of police power also rejected any attempt to attach legitimacy to Mixon's murder rampage[22] and Caroline Mixon, a cousin of Lovelle Mixon, paid a public tribute to the Oakland police, thanking them for serving and protecting the people of Oakland.[23]

At the Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz, Germany, the General Students' Committee (AStA) broke apart in April 2015 as a consequence of internal dispute over purported antisemitism after having organized an Information event about the Uhuru Movement on JGU campus in January.[24] The AStA distanced itself both from the Uhuru Movement, African People's Socialist Party and its leader Omali Yeshitela stating that "the struggle against racism and the consequences of colonialism should not blind us to other reactionary ideologies" and regretted providing a platform for this movement.[25]

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See also

References
  1. Standard Swahili-English Dictionary, Frederick Johnson. Oxford University Press (1951), pp. 138, 491.
  2. "African People's Socialist Party-USA - History". Asiuhuru.org. Retrieved 2013-01-05.
  3. Uhuru profile, sct.temple.edu; accessed September 18, 2015.
  4. "Uhuru Movement Dot Org: Welcome to the Uhuru Movement!". Uhurumovement.org. Retrieved 2013-01-05.
  5. "African People's Socialist Party-USA Constitution". uhurunews.com. Retrieved 2015-11-30.
  6. "War abounds! Break the Silence! Join the Black is Back march on Washington Nov 3rd". uhurunews.com. Retrieved 2015-11-30.
  7. "Imperialism: The Highest Stage of Capitalism". SocialistWorker.org. Retrieved 2018-11-15.
  8. "Platform – The African People's Socialist Party". apspuhuru.org. Retrieved 2018-11-15.
  9. ROCHEMONICA DAVEYAMY WIMMER, TIM (October 25, 1996). "Violence, fires erupt after police kill driver". St. Petersburg Times. Retrieved November 25, 2018.
  10. Landry, Sue (October 26, 1996). "Uhurus protest police treatment of blacks". St. Petersburg Times. Retrieved November 25, 2018.
  11. Jackson, Mike (October 13, 1991). "Group protests handling of man's death at jail". St. Petersburg Times. Retrieved November 25, 2018.
  12. Tubbs, Sharon (November 17, 1996). "Marchers attempt to heal the rifts". Tampa Bay Times. Retrieved November 25, 2018.
  13. "About Us". inpdum.org. Retrieved 2015-11-30.
  14. "Uhurus vs. Halloween display". St. Petersburg Times. October 23, 2004.
  15. "Uhurus went too far in destroying holiday display". St. Petersburg Times. October 23, 2004.
  16. "Protestor Tells Why He Heckled Obama". NPR. 2008-08-04. Retrieved 2013-01-05.
  17. Miller, Sunlen. "Protesters: "What About The Black Community, Obama?"". ABC News.
  18. "Israel's Action in Gaza Spurs Anti-Israel Rallies". adl.org. Anti-Defamation League.
  19. "Dozens march for Mixon, against police", San Francisco Chronicle, March 26, 2009.
  20. "Calling him a 'true hero', mourners hold vigil for suspected Oakland cop killer Lovelle Mixon", New York Daily News; accessed June 13, 2016.
  21. Woman says she pointed police to Oakland killer, San Francisco Chronicle, March 23, 2009.
  22. Kamiya, Gary (2009-03-28). "Oakland mourns". Salon.com. Archived from the original on October 23, 2012. Retrieved 2013-01-05.CS1 maint: unfit url (link)
  23. Kuruvila, Matthai (April 1, 2009). "Killer's cousin pays tribute to Oakland cops". The San Francisco Chronicle. Archived from the original on April 4, 2009. Retrieved April 2, 2009.
  24. Schmidt, Carina (April 30, 2015). "Jusos und CampusGrün: Knatsch im AStA, Zusammenarbeit geplatzt/Streit um Referentin eskaliert". Allgemeine Zeitung. Archived from the original on September 17, 2015. Retrieved September 17, 2015.
  25. "AStA distanziert sich von der Uhuru-Bewegung". General Students' Committee at the University of Mainz. Archived from the original on September 17, 2015.
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