Debunking the Myth that Africans Outside U.S. Have Not Helped Us

I wrote/posted an article yesterday challenging the merits of the so-called "American Descendants of Slaves (ADOS)" movement.  In response, a sister stated that Africans born outside of the U.S. have never done anything to help Africans within the U.S.  Her reference point was petti-bourgeoisie Africans from the continent who come to the U.S.  I responded that many Africans born within the U.S. turn their backs on our people also so that is an issue of class struggle within our communities, not a factor based on where we are born.  

I do thank her for her point because it illustrates just how uneducated we are about our collective African history.  And, as I pointed out in the last piece, this is the engine that drives a miss-information campaign like ADOS.  So, in our continuing effort to bring ideological struggle to our people around issues like this, I'm writing this piece to specifically refute the allegation that Africans outside the U.S. have done little to nothing to benefit the struggle for liberation being waged by Africans born within the U.S.  My reference point is of course heavily influenced by the last 35 years spent as an organizer for the Pan-Africanist All African People's Revolutionary Party (A-APRP).  That's central to this discussion because as a member of this organization I have been recruited by, have recruited, and have worked with Africans born in every part of the world.  Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, Azania (South Africa), Zimbabwe, Ghana, Guinea-Bissau, Sierra Leone, Gambia, Senegal, Guinea, Nigeria, Cameroons, Somalia, Jamaica, Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, Honduras, Cuba, Haiti, Brazil, you name it.  I've shared space, organizing experiences, food, and life with all sectors of our African family.  I've also spent those 35 years actively participating in the A-APRP's work study circle process.  This experience has permitted me to study our history as African people widely and consistently.  It was this process that exposed me to the level of struggle our people have waged, together, to be free, all over the world.  That's why I know of many, many, contributions Africans outside of the U.S. have made to advance our struggle even within this country.  I write this piece because in this ongoing battle over ideas, I'm hopeful some of the people, like the good and well meaning sister who responded yesterday, can benefit from the type of Pan-African perspectives I would humbly suggest she and those who agree with ADOS are lacking in their tools of analysis.  

First, I'd like to say I feel like an entire piece on the various revolts/slave revolts that took place, many successfully, in Africa to prevent us from being kidnapped, should be written (most of you saw the movie Amistad, what do you think that was?), and I think the very next follow up piece to this one will be a specific focus on that much needed research.  For this piece, the focus will be on the last 100 years because there is actually so much to say about this that one piece could never do the subject justice.  

Let's start with Marcus Mosiah Garvey and the Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA).  Founded in Jamaica in 1915 where he was born , Garvey moved in New York in hopes of connecting with his mentor Booker T. Washington, only to realize Washington had died just before Garvey arrived to the states.  By 1924, the UNIA has an estimated three to six million members.  Their newspaper, the "Negro World" was printed and distributed in 33 countries in English, French, and Spanish, the primary colonial languages (along with Portuguese) spoken by Africans kidnapped into slavery and colonialism.  By 1927, due in large part to the sabotage of the U.S. government, the UNIA was in serious decline, but their influence in the African communities in the U.S. can never be questioned and the major role Africans in the Caribbean played in moving the UNIA program must also be highly noted.  In fact, it is fair to say there would be no Nation of Islam within the U.S. without the influence of the UNIA.  Most credible historical sources indicate Elijah Muhammad, the patriarch of the Nation of Islam from 1934 until his death in 1975 was an early member of the UNIA.  Anyone who studies our people's histories can see the similarities between the program and ideas of the UNIA and the Nation of Islam.  The influence of Caribbean born Africans like Marcus and Amy Jacque Garvey on the African struggle within the U.S. is forever cemented in our legacy of resistance.

Moving to 1945, the landmark 5th Pan-African Congress (5th PAC) meeting occurred in Manchester, England.  The convener and organizer for that historic meeting was Kwame Nkrumah, then a young activist/student from Ghana.  Nkrumah made W.E.B. DuBois the symbolic head of that historic meeting which constituted more honor for DuBois than he ever received here within the U.S., even from Africans born and raised here, many of whom helped chase DuBois out of the U.S. for good in the late 50s.  5th PAC was attended by African revolutionaries from every corner of the Earth and it produced the definition for Pan-Africanism; one, unified, socialist Africa, as the solution to the problems impacting Africans everywhere.  Its important to say here that Pan-Africanism was never about helping neo-colonial countries as the ADOS talking heads often suggest.  Pan-Africanism is about destroying imperialism, including all the puppet regimes that serve imperialism in Africa today.  It's about creating a worldwide force of Africans everywhere who are committed to liberating Africa as our natural, historical, and correct land base as African people.  This of course cannot resonate with anyone who is fixated on fitting into the master's capitalist system which has demonstrated it will never reform enough to address the oppression it metes out against our people daily.  As was previously stated, this is a class struggle issue within the African community, not an issue based solely on where we are born.

5th PAC was overwhelming significant because of its call for African liberation movements to produce mass parties to overturn colonialism.  This is important because 5th PAC was a major factor in launching the African independence movement and that movement was pivotal in influencing the launching of the African civil rights movement within the U.S.  Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. says so himself after he was invited and attended the 1957 independence celebration in Ghana.  It was there that he developed a relationship with Kwame Nkrumah, Ghan'as first president.  And, Nkrumah became a quiet mentor to King until the latter's assassination in 1968.  Ghana's independence also marked Nkrumah's call for Ghana to become the base for worldwide African liberation.   He called for Africans everywhere to come to Ghana to help build and sustain that base and many answered his call.  Dr. DuBois and his wife Shirley Graham went and became advisors to Nkrumah. Both are buried there in the DuBois Center today.  Another fitting tribute to both Pan-Africanists that has never been equaled here in the U.S. despite DuBois's work to found the Niagara Movement and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in 1909.  

This groundswell continued into the 60s.  The newly independent Guinea, under the Democratic Party of Guinea (PDG) and Sekou Ture invited a delegation from the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) to visit Guinea in 1964.  When SNCC organizers like Ms. Fannie Lou Hamer came back to the U.S. their communications about what they saw in the newly independent and proud Guinea reverberated with the SNCC activists.  This development certainly contributed widely to influencing SNCC's militant push away from integration and towards the call SNCC made for Black power in June of 1966 in Mississippi.  The person who made that call was Kwame Ture, then known as Stokely Carmichael, the then chair of SNCC.  Ture became the poster child for the U.S. Black power movement e.g. its chief voice.  Of course, Ture himself wasn't even born within the U.S.  He immigrated here at 10 years old from Trinidad in the Caribbean.  He followed a long list of Trinidad born activists who played significant roles in the U.S. African movement, either directly or through ideological contributions.  Henry Sylvester Williams, George Padmore, C.L.R. James, to name a few.  

The Black power movement in the U.S. of course made major inroads to opening up the struggle to women's liberation, LGBTQ, and able body challenged movements.  Clearly, Africans from outside of the U.S. played major roles in this struggle.  This cannot be questioned by anyone.  This is especially true because it can be easily argued that the African civil rights and Black power movements would have looked drastically different, if they would have happened at all, without the heavy influence of the African independence movements.  The Land and Freedom Movement (better known as the Mau Mau) in Kenya, heavily influenced armed defense advocates within the U.S. like Robert Williams and Malcolm X.  And Kwame Nkrumah's essay on "The Spector of Black Power" written in 1968 at the height of urban resistance within U.S. cities was considered a blueprint by African activists within the U.S. at that time.  Another clear example of this can be seen just by looking at SNCC and Kwame Ture's contributions.  That delegation trip to Guinea was organized by Caribbean born entertainer Harry Belafonte.  Belafonte, along with Caribbean born Sidney Poitier, did much to contribute to our movements here in the U.S.  Poitier and his first wife Juanita even provided housing for Dr. Betty Shabazz, the widow of Malcolm X, and their six daughters after Malcolm's assassination.  As for Kwame Ture, this Caribbean born African went to prison dozens of times in the U.S.  Almost 30 times, fighting for African liberation in the Southern U.S.  As was already stated, the contributions of him and others are directly responsible for many of the gains enjoyed today by people who would deny his contributions.  Many of these people probably wouldn't risk a moment in jail for our people while Brother Ture, at the tender age of 24, permitted himself to become the national spokesperson for the movement and people of a country he was not even born in.

During those same 1960s, Fidel Castro, the leader of the Cuban Revolution, was declaring that African blood runs through the veins of every Cuban.  Today, we know Cuba is roughly about 70% African or Black.  Our people are the primary benefactors of the gains of the Cuban Revolution of which there are many.  And Cuba, understanding its links to Africans everywhere as Castro declared, has always seen its role as that of providing support to the African liberation movement.  That included Cuba sending almost half a million troops to Southern Africa in the 80s to stop the attempt by the same U.S. government many Africans today wish to integrate into, to support the racist apartheid regime's efforts to expand its racist policies throughout all of Southern Africa.  Cuba also provided refuge for many Africans fighting in the U.S.  First, it was Robert Williams, fleeing from illegal charges being leveled against him when he was president of the Monroe, North Carolina, U.S. chapter of the NAACP in 1957.  Then, it was Eldridge Cleaver, the troubled Black Panther Party leader who sought refuge in Cuba.  Then, the equally troubled Huey Newton for three years in the 70s.  Assata Shakur, the legendary Black Panther and Black Liberation Army leader was fortunately able to escape a U.S. prison and has been free in Cuba for over 30 years.  Nehanda Abodin, another U.S. African freedom fighter, just recently made her physical transition while living in peace in Cuba.  There are many, many others there as well.  If one thinks about this, its really an embarrassment that despite all the resources that have been won for African people in the U.S. directly because of the struggles these people named have waged, the African community within the U.S. is not even remotely organized to provide support for these warriors while the African national income in the U.S. rivals that of Cuba's entire gross national product.  Yet, this small island nation has done more for our freedom fighters than any of us here in the U.S. screaming about our rights.

In 1985, Muammar Qaddafi, the Libyan leader from North Africa, was invited to speak to the Nation of Islam's annual Savior's Day commemoration in Chicago, Ill, U.S., via closed circuit television.  Qaddafi calmly and resolutely urged all Africans in the U.S. serving in the U.S. military to immediately abandon their posts.  He advised that his government would provide training and arms to U.S. Africans to permit them to overthrow this backward government.  Whether you believe his offer to be possible or insane is not the point.  What is relevant is its hard for me to imagine any greater example of commitment and dedication to helping our struggle than the offer Qaddafi made that was viewed by millions of people around the world.  

Today, many Africans within the U.S. rely on the writings and speeches of freedom fighters like Malcolm and the Black Panther Party.  There's no argument that much of what all of those strugglers learned was picked up from Africans not born in this country.  Nkrumah, Ture, Amilcar Cabral, Patrice Lumumba, and many, many others like Cheikh Anta Diop and Dr. Ivan Van Sertima, all of whom were born in other countries, have provided much of the ideological foundation for liberation seekers of African descent within the U.S.

Even the Black Lives Matter movement owes much of its initial thrust to an African not born within the U.S. Opal Tometi, one of the three African women who gave this movement its life, has Nigerian roots from West Africa and thank goodness she does.  Maybe she was able to contribute to a much needed international perspective on police terrorism that the Black Lives Matter movement has always been able to articulate.  Police terrorism is a thing for African people not just in the U.S., but all throughout Europe - Britain, France, Germany, etc.  Also in Australia, and in occupied Palestine, better known as Israel.  The question people genuinely concerned about our people's progress have to ask themselves is why is this state terrorism against us an international phenomenon?  The answer will help you understand why our struggles are organically and historically linked in a way no fly by night movement will ever be able to disrupt.

And correct education requires that we immediately challenge this often repeated missive from the ADOS camp that the Pan-African movement has relied on Africans from the U.S. to do all of the work.  There's no question, and plenty of examples have been provided just in this piece, to illustrate that the Pan-Africanist movement for one unified socialist Africa has had clear and unquestionable leadership from Africa as it should be.  I've been able to grow as a Pan-Africanist activist myself based on the wisdom and support I've received from comrades all over the African world.  Anyone who says Africans outside of Africa don't work for Pan-Africanism need to study up on the great work being done for Pan-Africanism by organizations like the African Party for the Independence of Guinea-Bissau (PAIGC), Pan-African Union of Sierra Leone (PANAFU), Democratic Party of Guinea (PDG), Pan-Africanist Congress of Azania (PAC), Azanian People's Organization (AZAPO), Amilcar Cabral Ideological Institute of Nigeria, etc.  These organizations are in the forefront of the best Pan-Africanist work taking place in the world today.  I know this because I have interacted with those comrades on the ground for years, in Africa and within the U.S.  I would encourage people to investigate this work because its central to what the A-APRP is doing for Pan-Africanism, but that's another article at another time.  What's important for now is that we take every opportunity to challenge this notion that Africans within the U.S. are a separate breed of struggle than the rest of our African family.  This approach is dangerous because it does the work of our enemies by dividing us when every indication confirms that our best opportunity for justice is unity for African people everywhere.  But then, maybe the issue here with ADOS is the liberation examples I gave in this piece (of which I can provide many, many, more) are all connected to our independent struggle to gain self-determination e.g. destroying capitalism and bringing about revolutionary change for our people.  Nothing about what ADOS is talking about suggests they wish to travel down this road.  And, that gets us back to my initial point that this issue is one of class struggle, not where we as Africans are born.  The real gauge we need to be looking at is what these people want for our people.  What they want for themselves.  This struggle isn't one of where our people come from.  We have provided ample proof that our people struggle for the same freedom everywhere we are meaning if Africans come here they do the same thing here.  The disconnect must be what we are fighting for, not where the fighters came from.  ADOS wants inclusion into the capitalist system here in the U.S.  And, they feel our other outside U.S. African families, many of who helped break down barriers for us here, somehow represent competition with us born here for resources.  This is the same scarcity argument capitalism has used for centuries to keep people divided and unfocused on the source of all our problems - capitalism.  We are not disillusioned about what direction we need to go in and we will continue to point out these types of contradictions from those who apparently are.

Finally, to end on an extremely positive note, we point to the many tributes to Africans in the U.S. that exist throughout Africa.  And here, I'm only talking about the ones I've seen with my own eyes.  There's the aforementioned DuBois Center in central Accra, Ghana, where W.E.B. DuBois's actual library of work is housed.  Such a fitting tribute to Dr. DuBois, and his wife Shirley Graham.  There are also other tributes to Martin Luther King and Malcolm X throughout Ghana.  In Cape Coast, Ghana, there are two slave dungeons.  The Cape Coast dungeons and Elmira.  In Senegal, there's the Goree Island slave dungeons.  These horrible places all have tributes to us Africans lost in the middle passage.  These tributes have been honored by continental Africans for decades, but it was U.S. born Africans who attempted to disrespect these sacred places.  Essence Magazine, believe it or not, actually planned a jazz festival at Elmira before someone got sense enough to mobilize a campaign to halt that from happening.  In Sierra Leone, a youth center/school in Freetown is named after U.S. born Pan-Africanist and long time A-APRP organizer (and All African Women's Revolutionary Union leader) Mawina Kouyate.  Sister Mawina made Manhattan in New York City her organizing base for many years, but you won't find any tribute to her there.  Instead, besides the youth center in Freetown, there is the wonderful gravesite for Sister Mawina that shines bright in Gambia, just outside the capitol city of Banjul.  And then all throughout Africa you can see everyday tributes to Africans born within the U.S.  In Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania and Accra, Ghana, I've seen barbershops galore adorned with the likenesses of U.S. Africans public figures like hip/hop moguls P Diddy, Jay Z, and Ice Cube.  Basketball players Michael Jordan, Grant Hill, etc.  On beauty shops in those same places there are huge images of Jennifer Hudson and Rhianna.  In Dakar, Senegal, posters of Beyonce can be found everywhere. You can see most of those images in the slideshow on the first page of this site.  On the flipside, most Africans within the U.S. would be challenged to name a single celebrity in Africa if you take hip/hop star Akon out of the mix.  

All of these examples of Africans outside of Africa who have not only struggled for our liberation here in the U.S., but honor us everyday in every way possible are available for all to see when most of us don't even know they exist.  If you are a believer in any of this ADOS nonsense, you owe your people at least an honest effort to address the severe knowledge gap that exists with their talking points.  Africans in the U.S. are not a separate tribe of Africans.  We are the result of the savage slave trade and colonial domination of Africa.  Our culture is still African culture which guides us in seeking our dignity.  And, the same reality exists for other Africans throughout the diaspora as well as those on the continent.  The evidence of all of this is ill refutable.  So, those who follow ADOS, please stop using your random individualistic encounters with the most backward Africans from the continent to justify your dysfunctional and uninformed interpretation of what our people from other parts of the world are doing.  Please stop that.  You know as well as any of us that there are positive Africans in the U.S. and there are negative ones.  You come across each variety every day like each and every one of us.  So, clearly you can deduce that the same reality exists with Africans everywhere else.  The problem is most of us in the U.S. know we don't know much of anything about the world outside of our individual experiences.  And, this is by design.  Its not your fault, but now that you know there is a deficiency, it is your responsibility to correct it.  Please get to work!  As for the leaders of ADOS, that last message is doubtfully for you.  There's absolutely no way anyone talking about this stuff as long as you have is confused about the points raised in this and the previous piece.  Your position is crafted to misinform.  That's a crime against our people and humanity, but we will confront you at every turn and we have complete faith in our people to eventually figure out this sham for themselves.