UhuruNews
Published Oct 13, 2010

Philadelphia—On October 13 the movement for social justice throughout the world won a critical victory for the democratic rights of African people, oppressed and freedom loving people everywhere when Diop Olugbala, International President of the International People’s Democratic Uhuru Movement (InPDUM), walked out of his sentencing hearing in a Philadelphia courtroom with two years probation. He could have been sentenced to up to ten years in prison.

Diop’s co-defendant Shabaka Mnombatha was sentenced to 12 months of unsupervised probation.

In a courtroom packed with about 50 supporters, neocolonial judge Roxanne Covington handed down the sentences despite the prosecutor’s insistence that Diop do prison or jail time.

Today’s victory followed months of demonstrations, letters, call-ins, mailings, and emails to the judge from hundreds of supporters from throughout the US and as far away as Sierra Leone, Peru and Spain.

A militant demonstration in support of Diop was also held in front of the US embassy in London today, to coincide with the militant demonstration that was held at the Philadelphia courthouse.

This worldwide outpouring of support for Diop’s case from a broad base of African people and our allies played a key role in forcing the judge to back down on the State’s plan to imprison Diop for his courageous stance against police violence and murder, homelessness, and for economic development in the oppressed and exploited African working class community.

During today’s sentencing, Diop gave an eloquent statement in his own defense, in which he refused to apologize for his actions protesting the conditions facing African people in this country.

Diop stated that he was not a violent person, rather that his work is intended to “end the violence that the African community suffers.”

He reminded judge Covington that she would not be sitting on the bench today had it not been for the movement of African workers and leaders such as Martin Luther King and so many others who unapologetically carried out just the kind of protest in the 1960s that Diop was being sentenced for today.

Covington responded that she did realize that and stated that her father had been the comptroller for King’s Southern Christian Leadership Conference.

She also expressed unity with defense attorney Michael Coard’s statement that giving jail time to either Diop or Shabaka would be an “outrage.”

Nevertheless, Covington proceeded to sentence Diop to two years of supervised probation, along with full court costs, probation fees and a mandatory “anger management class.”

Diop and his defense committee plan to appeal the sentence.

Today’s sentencing followed Diop’s August 24 framed-up felony conviction on an assault of a police officer.

The charges stem from a March 2009 Philadelphia city council meeting discussing neocolonial mayor Michael Nutter’s proposed city budget, which involved massive cutbacks to needed services in the deeply impoverished African community.

At the same time the budget proposed to spend 1 billion dollars beefing up the terroristic police force responsible for the reign of terror of murders, violence and imprisonment faced by black people daily.

Diop, along with Shabaka Mnombatha and other Uhuru Movement comrades and supporters, joined hundreds of other groups and individuals who were holding signs and protesting the budget cuts inside the city council chambers that day.

During the council hearing plain-clothed police agents singled out Diop, attacking him and putting him in a chokehold.

Diop was known for previously serving mayor Nutter with a people’s subpoena to appear at a Tribunal on Reparations for African people held in December 2008.

The tribunal came just four months after Diop boldly challenged then-candidate Barack Obama’s town hall meeting in St. Petersburg, FL in 2008 by raising the question, “What about the black community, Obama?”

Diop’s case has garnered global support because he is a political prisoner of this period of struggle, while others known as political prisoners come from the era of the Black Liberation Movement of the 60s.

Diop’s case brings to light the fact that the United States today, with its neocolonialist strategy, is waging a war against the African community in the form of brutal police containment policies that cannot stand freedom of speech criticism, especially from the African revolutionary sector of the social justice movement.

Far from silencing or intimidating the movement, Diop’s case has served to build the Uhuru Movement and the overall struggle against US imperialism.

InPDUM’s long-standing demand for reparations to African people and genuine economic development, not police containment, is now being echoed in African communities throughout the US and the world. The many fronts of the Uhuru Movement and the African Socialist International continue to grow every day.

Now, we must transfer this energy to Free the Scott Sisters and Mumia Abu Jamal!

Join the Black is Back march and rally on November 13 in Washington, DC and the InPDUM Convention scheduled for February 19 and 20 in Philadelphia, to advance this great victory on today.

Uhuru!
Free Diop!

INTRODUCTION

On Sept. 25, 2010, the RPMA held its Mesa Directiva meeting at Café On A Street, in Oxnard, Califaztlán. The four current members of the mesa were present: Ernesto Bustillos (Coordinator of the RPMA), Luis Moreno (Editor of Guerillera/os de La Pluma and the RPMA webpage), Francisco Romero (Coordinator of Membership and Organization), and Antonio Velasquez (Coordinator of Finances).

It has been a practice of the RPMA to be as transparent as possible in the workings and procedures that take place with the RPMA. Therefore, we publish/or post on our web the outcomes of our Mesa Directiva and our General meetings. As far as we know, the RPMA is the only Raza media organization that regularly makes public minutes and outcomes of its meetings.

We believe that this transparency allows others to better understand the type of organization that the RPMA. We hope that through our openness other media worker will be persuaded to uniting with us to build a media that is in the service of our people’s struggle for justice, peace, and self-determination.

Below are the outcomes of the RPMA mesa directiva meeting of Sept. 25, 2010.

RESOLUTIONS/OUTCOMES

Media Campaign:
It was agreed to implement the “media campaign” that was proposed at our last General Meeting (August 28th, in Los Angeles, Califaztlán). The campaign will end with a forum in Jan. 2011. At the forum, media workers representing a broad spectrum of progressive/revolutionary journalism will be invited to describe/demonstrate how they present their point of view on issues of importance to the Raza community, specifically their perspectives on the attacks coming down in Arizona and U.S. We will invite photographers/artists, editorial writers, general reporters, filmmakers, etc. to demonstrate how they present, through their media of choice, their view/perspective on this issue. Compa Francisco, with the assistance of Antonio, will organize the forum. Other RPMA members will be asked to help out.

International Delegation:
We will work to send a group of 4 to 5 RPMA members on a “working international delegation” in April 2011 (Spring Break). Possible countries could be Venezuela, Bolivia, Nicaragua, or El Salvador (in that order). Our goal will be to learn and share how the “bourgeois/mainstream” media is use to oppress nuestros pueblos; but when the media is in the hands of the people, it can be used to liberate. Ernesto and Francisco will take the lead on this task. A concrete plan (dates, costs, etc.) will be presented at our next General Meeting in Jan. of 2011 for discussion.

Guerrillera/o Award:
Ernesto will send out a list of possible recipients for consideration of the “2010” Guerrillera/o of the year award. The mesa will add names if necessary and choose the winner of the 2010 award. The award will be presented at our next general meeting in Jan 2011.

RPMA Mesa Elections:
Ernesto will send out names of members who are eligible to be elected to the mesa directiva of the RPMA. The election will take place at the RPMA general meeting in January 2011. Special effort will be made to recruit mujeres into the mesa/RPMA leadership.

Organization/Membership:
Compa Francisco made a recommendation (and it was accepted) that we form an “advisory committee” for the association. Members of the committee will be “respected and known personalities of our movement”. Their role will be to advice and help with the recruitment of more members into the association. Francisco will develop a written outline and present it for approval at our next general meeting.

We will also request to officially become members of progressive international media associations (such as Prensa Latina, etc.). This will make us a more viable and effective media network, and bring more recognition to the work of the RPMA. Compa Antonio will follow-up on this matter.

Website and Projects:
The Mesa Directiva expressed approval of the work that was found on in our Web Page and journal, La Pluma. Everyone committed themselves to complete projects, such as the books and articles to be posted on our Web Page. Compa Luis will follow-up and remind people of their commitments and projects.

It was decided that in the near future, a “policy” for posting on our Web Page will be developed. Items posted will be given priority as follows: First priority would be assigned to RMPA members, then non-member Raza writers, other progressive (non-Raza) media workers, and so forth. The objective must be to create/or advance Raza journalism. Until we have substantial “Raza” media being produced and shared with the RPMA, we will continue to post as is. Compa Antonio raised this particular discussion.

There was also discussion and it was suggested that we place as much emphasis on “reporting” on the news, as we currently do with “creating” news. Compa Luis raised this issue and shared the (reporting) work of the RPMA that went into the U.S. Social Forum held this year in Detroit.

Fundraising:
We need to create a budget based on “a plan of actions/events” we want to organize during 2011. Once this tentative budget is developed, we will forward it to Antonio, who will them move to find funding for it. In the meantime, Compa Antonio will be looking into (a) organizing a nonprofit status and (b) use allies as fiscal sponsors for projects that need to be immediately funded.

Conferences and Workshops:
Ernesto reviewed some of the Conferences that should be of interest to the RPMA and, which we must make efforts to participate in some level. These include the National Association of Chicano Studies, MEChA SDSU High School Conference (Nov. 20, 2010), Teachers-4-Social Justice (Oct. 9, 2010, in San Francisco), and Global Studies Conference. Members are encouraged to attend and report on these and other movement/progressive conferences.