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TOWARDS A PLEBISCITE FOR SELF DETERMINATION OF THE AFRO DESCENDANT COLONY IN THE UNITED STATES: AN IMARI OBADELE READER AND STRATEGIC PLAN
“Our method entails campaigns for consent, followed by plebiscites, followed by defense of our lands. . . .”
- Imari Obadele
PLEASE TAKE THE AFRODESCENDANT STEERING COMMITTEE SELF DETERMINATION SURVEY
The dictionary definition of a plebiscite is “the direct vote of all the members of an electorate on an important public question”
In WAR IN AMERICA, first drafted in October 1966 and revised and published January 1968, Imari Obadele writes,
“THE ANSWER TO FEDERAL OPPOSITION
THE answer to federal opposition to black state power is a complex of studied moves POLITICAL, DIPLOMATIC, ECONOMIC, AND MILITARY.
The crucial first step is the early acceptance of an essential and inevitable decision by those who seek black state power. This is the decision to withdraw the state (ultimately, withdraw the entire, new, five-state union of Mississippi, Louisiana, Alabama, Georgia, and South Carolina) from the United States and establish a separate nation.
This is necessary because the inevitable opposition of the federal government would be irresistible so long as it operates within the state; it must be put OUTSIDE the state.
Of first importance are the diplomatic moves. As Malcolm X taught, the black man’s struggle must be INTERNATIONALIZED, for it is only within the United States that we are a minority. Joined with other peoples of color beyond the American borders, black men bestow upon white men the status of a minority.
The struggle must be internationalized for an even more basic and directly negotiable reason: we must draw to our cause the moral and material support of people of good will throughout the world; this support, correctly used, could impose upon the United States federal government an amount of caution sufficient, when coupled with the military viability of the black state itself, to protect that state from destruction beneath certain and overwhelming federal Power.
In short, the effort to win public support for the black struggle from the Afro-Asian nations, started in earnest by Malcolm X and maintained so resolutely by Robert Williams, MUST BE CONTINUED AND INTENSIFIED; we must, moreover, continue and intensify the effort to raise serious, substantial questions concerning the status of black people in the United States and bring these questions before the United Nations and the World Court. Fortunately, the groundwork for this effort has already (by 1966) been faithfully laid by such men as Robert A. Brock, founder of Los Angeles’ SELF-DETERMINATION COMMITTEE, and Baba Oserjeman Adefumi, founder of the New York-headquartered YORUBA COMMUNITY.
As Adefumi, Brock, and their fellow workers have shown, the central questions to be brought before the United Nations and the World Court are Two:
A. THE RIGHT OF BLACK PEOPLE AS FREE MEN TO CHOOSE WHETHER OR NOT THEY WISH TO BE CITIZENS OF THE UNITED STATES.
This right was never exercised: freed from slavery by constitutional provision, black people were given no choice as to whether they wished to be citizens, go back to Africa or to some other country, or set up an independent nation. Instead, the OBLIGATIONS of citizenship were automatically conferred upon us by the white majority, while the RIGHTS of citizenship for black people were made conditional rather than absolute, circumscribed by a constitutional provision that “Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation," and subjected to 90 years of interpretation and reinterpretation by the courts, the Congress, and the state legislatures.
Adjudication of this question must bestow upon those black people wishing it a guarantee of their right to be free of the jurisdiction of the United States and assure that their right to freedom shall not have been jeopardized by the payment of taxes, participation in the election process, or service in the military during the period before adjudication. These later acts are participated in by the blacks in America who seek adjudication, only under coercion and as defensive measures.
B. THE RIGHT OF BLACK PEOPLE TO REPARATIONS FOR THE INJURIES AND WRONGS DONE US AND OUR ANCESTORS BY REASON OF UNITED STATES LAW.
Reparations have never been paid to black people for the admitted wrongs of slavery (or since slavery) inflicted upon our ancestors with the sanction of the United States Constitution — which regulated the slave trade and provided for the counting of slaves — and the laws of several states. The principle of reparations for national wrongs, as for personal wrongs, is well established in international law. The West German government, for instance, has paid 850 million dollars in equipment and credits, in reparations to Israel for wrongs committed by the Nazis against the Jews of Europe. Demands for reparations, funneled through a united black power Congress, must include not only the demand for money and goods such as machinery, factories and laboratories, but a demand for land. And the land we want is the land where we are: MISSISSIPPI, LOUISIANA, ALABAMA, GEORGIA, and SOUTH CAROLINA.
The bringing of the first question to the United Nations — the question of black people’s right to self-determination — creates a substantial question demanding action by that world body and puts the black power struggle in America into the world spotlight where the actions of the United States against us are open to examination and censure by our friends throughout the world. It provides these friends, moreover, with a legal basis for their expressions of support and their work in our behalf.
The raising of the demand for land, as part of the reparations settlement, infuses needed logic and direction into the American black struggle and increases the inherent justice of our drive for black state power and the separation of the new five-state union from the United States.
The separation is necessary because history assures us that the whites of America would not allow a state controlled by progressive black people, opposed to the exploitation and racism and organized crime of the whole, to exist as a part of the whole. Separation is necessary because black people must separate ourselves from the guilt we have borne as partners, HOWEVER RELUCTANT, to the white man in his oppression and crimes against the rest of humanity. Separation is possible because, first, it is militarily possible.
When the 13 American colonies declared their independence from Britain, they also forged an alliance with France, which not insignificantly contributed to the colonies’ victory. When the Confederacy separated from the United States, it formed alliances with Britain and other European powers, and these alliances might have sustained her independence had not this creature been so severely weakened by sabotage and revolts of the slaves themselves and their service in the Union Army. In more recent times the state of Israel was created in 1948 and maintained against Arab arms by her alliances with the United States and Britain. In 1956 the independence of Egypt was maintained against invasion by Israel, supported by France and Britain, by her alliance with Russia: Russia threatened to drop atomic missiles on London if the invaders did not withdraw. In 1959-1960 an independent, anti-capitalist Cuba was saved from invasion and subjugation by American might (as American might would invade and subjugate another small Caribbean island republic, the Dominican Republic, in 1965) because, again, of an alliance with Russia.
The lesson is clear: black power advocates must assiduously cultivate the support of the Afro-Asian world. MORE, that moment when state power comes into our hands is the same moment when formal, international alliances must be announced. Indeed, these alliances may prove our only guarantee of continued existence.
Excerpt from Imari Obadele speech to the Toward a Black University Conference at Howard University, November 1968:
Government Must Be By Consent
“Ever since the American Declaration of Independence an accepted principle of international law has been that men need only be bound by government that arises from the consent of the governed. That is to say, a group of persons must consent - must agree - to be governed by a government or else that government is a creature of oppression and its rule is tyranny. A group of people has a right - indeed, they have a duty to throw off such tyrannical government and institute such new government and new forms as to themselves seem most likely to assure their future happiness and success.
Thus, because the founders of the Republic of New Africa understood that the government of the United States rules black people without our studied consent, and because the founders understood, therefore, that for black people the United States government is tyranny and an exercise in oppression, we created a new government - The Republic of New Afrika - to which black people can freely and with great hope and justification, give their consent. The new forms which we are instituting to assure our future happiness and success are those to which black people throughout the United States have traditionally aspired, in order to achieve freedom, justice, prosperity, progress, and brotherhood. And they are spelled out in the ‘Aims of the Revolution’ contained in the Republic’s Declaration of Independence (March 31, 1968).
Primary Objective of the Republic of New Afrika: Win Consent of the People
Therefore, the primary objective of the government of the New Republic of of New Africa, in our peaceful campaign to win soverignty over lands on the continent that righfully belong to black people, has been to create opportunities for black people to show that the government of the United States does not have our consent, and that the Republic of New Africa does have our consent.
This continues to be our policy and the primary strategical objective of the Republic of New Africa. Wherever our Consulates and pledged citizens exist - whether in our subjugated colonies in the Northern cities or our subjugated territories in the South - the policy is the same and constantly pursued: to create the means for black people to express thier consent to be governed by the Republic of New Africa.
Massive Mis-Education of Black People in America Concerning Citizenship and Building a Separate Independent Black Nation
Because of the massive mis-education of black people in America concerning rights and obligations, the Republic’s campaigns for consent are often described as, and often become campaigns to win consent. For most black people do not understand that their present evidences of consent (payment of taxes, voting, serving in the Army, etc.) have been forced from us by a tyrannical government that has never allowed us a free choice - free consent - in the matter of citizenship. . . .
To break through the massive mis-education of our people . . . it is necessary to make them understand - not just in their brains but in their gut-bottom emotions - that the only answer to ending the oppression and misery under which they daily live is to join in building a separate, free, powerful black nation of our own right now, right here on this continent. The next step is to convince them that it can be done.
But the first, most difficult, but most important step is to convince them that our new nation is the only answer to misery and oppression.
Winning Consent for the Republic of New Afrika is Dangerous Work
This work - the work of convincing people anywhere in our subjugated areas within the United States, that our separate nation is the only answer and to join us in building it - is fraught with danger wherever we conduct it.
Even though the Republic’s official pronouncements have made it clear that (1) we wish to negotiate a peaceful settlement of our differences with the United States and that (2) we do not seek to overthrow the United States government or alter its form but only to set up our own independent government - despite this, the United States government is fully capable (though wrong under its own law and international law) of harassing and jailing our workers and leaders. Indeed, the likelihood of this happening increases geometrically as we become more successful and as mis-informed whites (the majority in America) feel tht we are seriously threatening their prestige and power (that is: their white supremacy and white domination).
Moreover, every state in the Union has its own laws on subversion, overthrow, syndicalism and the like. In the five states of the South these laws could be used against us with considerably more justification than similar federal laws - and almost certainly will be. . . . Then, there is the use of uniformed and uninformed white violence.
Workers and officers of the Republic face all these dangers . . . merely for organizing people to express their free consent for a government. It can be no other way. And because we understand the call of history, we can do nothing else but to press on for the freedom of our people, along this certain course: Independence.”
In 1970, Imari Obadele discussed the concept of the plebiscite in his work:
Revolution and Nation Building: Strategy for Building the Black Nation in America
by Imari Obadele
“The mechanical steps to independence . . . . We begin with a petition drive. . . . For the key to our legitimacy is consent: the will of the people. The petition simply asserts that the undersigned citizens agree to hold an election, with U.N. participation, to determine whether or not the District (the Afro Descendant colony in the United States) shall be independent of the jurisdiction of the United States. The petition also urges the New York legislature and the U.S. Congress to change the law so that communities which wish to separate peacefully (Siphiwe note: through emigration, repatriation, or independence) may do so.
Indeed, along with the petition drive a specific campaign must be conducted among New York legislators and U.S. Congressmen (particularly black ones) to make them - and, concurrently, the world - see that our cause is just under moral law and correct under international law and that the law of the United States is deficient in failing to provide a peaceful formula for the separation of communities seeking their independence.
No one need have any illusions about the prospect of changing the law. But the campaign among the lawmakers is a testament to our peaceful intentions and an important element in the battle for world opinion and support which New Afrika must wage . . . in capitals of the world and in the approaches to the United Nations. . . .
Let us return a moment to the first question: how sovereignty is to be achieved in the first place. From what has already been indicated, it is clear that the overall strategy is to present the United States, the United Nations, and the world with an implacable accomplished fact: the free vote of a community for independence. It is, then, to seek a favorable deployment of world-wide diplomatic pressures and internal (U.S.) political pressures. It is, finally, to follow up the independence vote with creation of a local government and a pattern of action by the local government and the Republic that constitutes the exercise of Sovereignty. In other words, the Government, after the vote, must act like a government.” pp. 42-45
“Oppressed as a group, we must rise up as a group. This is not only the common sense of physics applied to human dynamics, whereby the power of thirty million people acting in unison is greater than the power of thirty million people acting individually, it is also a common and noble instinct of man, having to do with survival of the species. . . . We are an oppressed people - oppressed not only by the white ruling class but in a quite real and deeply rooted sense by the WHOLE white majority. We are not a part of them. We are robbed by them, and ALL of them partake of the riches that flow to them spiritually and materially, from our exploitation. Let them if they would call to us and say, ‘Join us in the American political revolution first - and when we are in power, we will wipe out racial oppression.” No. We ARE no longer slaves. The fight for power WITHIN the American society is theirs. OUR energies now must be spent in marshaling our resources for our own well-being and strength, that we may, through our own power, free ourselves of oppression, that we may, through our own power, reconstruct the black personality, which is the first step toward freedom from oppression. We have a need, as a people, to march to a different drummer - and a right. We have a right to create a quality of life that is uniquely ours, meeting OUR needs, reflecting OUR ambitions. . . . Our method entails campaigns for consent, followed by plebiscites, followed by defense of our lands. . . . By this element we leave to the white majority any war for control of the American machinery of government. We seek no control over their people or their goods. Neither do we seek all of their states or half of them or even one-quarter of them. We seek but one-tenth of the states over which they claim sovereignty. Our claim finds its justice not simply in the fact that we are one-tenth of the people in America but that these states - Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia and South Carolina - have been our traditional home for three centuries, we have worked the land and developed it, and have fought to stay there against terror and murder and assault and intimidation and deprivations of all sorts. We can say: this land is ours. Here we shall build a new nation: in peace, if peace is permitted us; in war, if it is forced upon us. Our method of achieving this sovereignty over our land is the method of men of peace, of African men who love justice and honor law. . . . Next we shall demonstrate to the world, by means of a plebiscite, a vote, that it is New Afrika, not the United States, which has the consent of the people who dominate those areas.” pp 72-75
“But it is not enough to visualize the New Society. This has never been enough. It is not enough to make declarations and conceive structures through which to achieve those visions. Men have always had their lofty visions and their good intentions. What counts is men themselves: how men apply themselves to the tasks which MUST be performed if the visions are to materialize. And so, permit me a final thought, a final word - about US.
. . . . I know that victory is not assured. We can have victory, of course: IF the circumstances are right and IF we pay the price. Those of us who profess to be in the leadership work to make the circumstances right. But we wonder - I wonder, seventeen months after the founding of the Republic - if we are willing to pay the price. I wonder because in seventeen months I have seen ‘strong’ brothers and ‘beautiful’ sisters cop out. I have seen them fail one another. I have seen men who profess to be soldiers fail to be on time, fail to obey orders, fail to show up for duty. I have seen the makers of burning speeches fail to carry out the charges of their offices. I have seen citizens give money lavishly at emotional mass rallies and fail to pay their small regular taxes. I have seen us pledge our lives and our fortunes but fail to show up for an hour’s worth of typing, an hour’s drive to the printer’s or the airport. . . . The thing that is wrong with us is that we have been imbued with a slave mentality. We have been robbed of self-confidence, instilled with self-hate, and turned into a race of selfish, paranoic, super-sensitive individuals. It is almost needless to say that none of this was by accident. But the first step in the cure is to recognize and acknowledge the illness. We are the richest slaves in the world, but nowhere do we pay the freight in our fight for freedom. It was more than coincidence that soon after white money was withdrawn from SNCC and CORE they went into decline; it is more than accident that SCLC looks to whites for its largest donations. . . . In like manner we admire the resolute and victorious Vietnamese, but we seem not so sure that freedom and an uncertain future are better than well fed, indolent, two-car slavery. We want freedom but will risk noting important to get it. In this moment of crisis brothers and sisters cop out - leaving the Movement the poorer for their going - because they have to ‘get my own thing together,’ meaning their job or business or profession or the house with which they are trying to keep up with the Roosevelts Joneses. They cop out because they have been ‘left to do all the work,’ or because somebody’s attitude ‘bugged’ them, or because ‘everybody around here is jeffing,’ or because ‘i’ll be back when the real ‘get-down’ starts.’ A people like that deserves no freedom. What is more, they will get no freedom. But the children deserve it. Must we leave it for the children to get it, leaving them to the risk of becoming warped in this unchanged society? . . . It is, next, to understand the method, the technique for winning sovereignty, which has been laid out for us: the campaigns for consent, the development of foreign and domestic support, the limited objective and the strong military. Finally, it is to bring yourself to the Republic. It is to put down hesitation, stop waiting for the organization to be perfect - give up your special cop-out - and become a part of NEW AFRIKA NOW. It is to bring your talents and your devotion and pledge with us to work unceasingly and selflessly with great discipline - discipline - knowing that each of us, particularly because of the damage oppression has done to us, has many shortcomings and styles that may constitute severe sources of irritation, but vowing with your utmost determination that none of these will separate you from the Movement or from your brothers and sisters in the Movement.” pp 76-80
Eight Strategic Elements
“There are eight strategic elements which are required for the successful establishment of an independent black state on the American mainland. They are these:
Brains
Labor
Natural Resources
Internal Domestic Support
International Support
A Limited Objective
Inherent Military Viability
A Second-Strike Capability
The combination of brains, labor and national resources is what produces wealth, without which no country can contemplate true independence. . . .
Non-New Afrikan Blacks in America Must Support the Provisional Government of the Republic of New Afrika
“Non-New Afrikan blacks in America must support us in a variety of ways. Support of the campaign for reparations is essential. Black Congressmen must take the lead in campaigning through Congress for a reparations settlement which includes substantial payment to the black nation, to the Republic of New Africa, even if it includes direct payments to individuals. But we are completely against reparations payments which go to whites or to U.S. government agencies to use for us - this is no reparations at all. We are also against using funds from our reparations settlement to pay capitalists for the plants and mines which we take over in the South. If at all, payment for these should be arranged in negotiation with our government. But the cold cash of our reparations settlement, and the trading credits, must be largely used to acquire the machine, to improve and expand industrial plants.
The support of non-New African blacks in America must, obviously, include sending dollars and gold, silver and diamonds, which we have in abundance in our jewelry to New Africa so that however long it takes to achieve a meaningful reparations settlement with the U.S. or however destructive our warfare in the South, we will not be without acceptable media for acquiring the machine through international trade. Blacks remaining within the U.S. must also - and importantly - use their influence, so long as it exists, to restrain the hand of the United States in using its court and military establishments against us. Indeed, to put this positively, blacks remaining in the U.S. must exert every influence to help us force the United States to settle with us justly - on the basis of plebiscites and international law - our claims to sovereignty and reparations.
International Support is Equally Important
But international support is equally important in staying the hand of the U.S. government against us. International Support is a crucial factor in assuring that our war for independence will neither be interminable nor unsuccessful. It is not only a matter of direct material or arms aid; just as the deployment of United States forces on alert status in such places as the Sea of Japan and Korea has been of some value to the VIetnamese, so the same or similar deployments would be of value to us. Too, on the military side, the possibility - however remote, however logistically difficult -that Chinese troops might, if asked by us, make an appearance in the United States such as Alaska or Hawaii, or at some oversees point where the United States has military commitments; the possibility that African nations in retaliation for U.S. military action against us might take action against the U.S. within their countries, which could include breaking off relations, seizures of property and concerted military action against . . . . allies of the U.S. and supported by and relied upon by the U.S. - these two possibilities count as major elements in our calculated use of foreign support to stay the hand of the U.S. agains us and move that government toward a peaceful settlement with us.
Thus, in New Africa we have upon us the obligation to cultivate unilaterally and through regional associations the support of foreign powers. Ultimately we look to the United Nations as the power where world opinion - supported by the pressures generated by the operation of these eight strategic elements which we are discussing will validate our independence and our claim against the United States for reparations. But it seems clear that the enforcement of our claims, whatever validation we receive beyond these shores, will depend on our own success at arms.
We follow a classic principle of political science; that for a small nation (us) to maintain itself against a big nation (the United States), it is necessary for the small nation to have an alliance with another big nation (China) or groups of nations (the anti-imperialist nations of Africa and Asia).
The Sixth Strategic Element - the Limited Objective - Has a Clear and Undeniable Importance
This success is made not alone on the battlefield, or even in the very important - indeed vital - preparations behind the battlefield. It is made also through the terms of the war, through the objectives being sought or defended. The sixth strategic element - the Limited Objective - has a clear and undeniable importance.
What we are talking about here is that instead of seeking the overthrow of the U.S. government of the control of 50 states or even 25 states, we seek merely five states. This is only one-forth of the states, and we are one-tenth of the population. Together they are five of the poorest states in the Union. They have great numbers of black people, suffering both a relative and absolute educational poverty, severe health and nutritional problems, and, in many areas, an endemic culture of poverty. They are underdeveloped. In short, the land we seek is an area which white Americans may feel is well worth giving up - once they have reached the point where giving up something seems inevitable or, at least, a better course than destruction and death.
Military Viability
Now, how do we get white people to this point? We would hope that polemics and reason would do it. We would hope that things like this book and diplomatic and political pressures would do it. Unfortunately history seems to teach us otherwise. We would love to be wrong. Yet what we learn from history is the unmistakable promise that the white man will fight us. And so, we must be prepared to fight him - and win - for our limited objective. We must have, therefore, an inherent Military Viability. Our army and our people must be able to survive destruction, and survive not just for a day or a few days but for many weeks and months, for years, if necessary, to establish our independence. And we must at the same time be able to inflict severe damage upon the enemy.
Sometimes the will of our people to suffer through war and persevere for years for our freedom - as the Vietnamese have done, as the black Angolans are doing, as the white American colonists did in the past - is doubted. So many of us are such comfortable slaves. Only time will tell. But if we do not have the will, if we do not persevere we will not win our freedom. It is that simple. Foreign aid and foreign alliances will not win it for us. Only through our own will. Only through our own perseverance in war, in the midst of suffering deprivation, and death. Only out of this.
And the role of the people is crucial. In the South, where we must ultimately deploy the Black Legion as our main-force army, our strategy has to include the people on the land and in the cities as a vital element. The Army must be able to move in secret and conceal itself. It must be able to depend on the people for reconnaissance and intelligence information, against the enemy. And it must be able to depend on the people to deny to the enemy food, general supplies, transport and sanctuary in order to maximize for the enemy his supply, concealment, and logistical problems.
Finally, beyond the South, the black man’s SECOND STRIKE CAPABILITY must be believable. The second strike capability is the Underground Army, the black guerillas in the cities. So long as black people are able to remain in the cities - and there are over 120 major cities where the brothers have used the torch - and retain relative freedom of movement, the black man has, or can develop, the means for destroying white industrial capacity and - if need be - white America in general as mercilessly as a missile attack.
Although the Republic of New Afrika neither directs nor controls these guerrillas - nor is in anyway more positive than the rest of you that they even exist - to the extent that they do exist and support the national policy and objectives of the Republic of New Africa, and to the extent that their power is believable, to these extents is the war foreshortened and more quickly will come the success of our independent black state on the American mainland.”
In February 1972, The Black Scholar published Imari Obadele’s, “The Struggle is for Land” in which he wrote,
“The problem with international law is that there is nobody there to enforce it - except the powerful. Powerful nations enforce international law only when it suits them - or when they are forced to. . . . The development of foreign support, inside and outside the United Nations, is another of the vital supporting strategies. . . . “
In 1972, Imari Obadele also wrote
FOUNDATIONS OF THE BLACK NATION
“In two small books issued by me in 1968 and 1970 War In America and Revolution And Nation-Building I detailed the theory to be applied by Africans in the United States in liberating a land mass for our national home. Today We are applying those theories in the Kush District of Mississippi. The present book covers the period immediately following theory. It brings together letters and articles that have emerged during the first two years of the campaign in Kush as the Provisional Government seeks (1) to inform and organize the people on the land for a plebiscite and for revolutionary resistance, (2) to generate support among blacks throughout America for the struggle in Kush, (3) to engineer acceptance of black independence by the US. Govemmen", and (4) to use attacks upon the RNA Provisional Government~such as the armed assaul and prosectiuon of the RNA - 11 to accomplish the other three aims.
What is more, the struggle can be successful. A great deal, however, depends upon how fast and how completely Africans in America can un-track their minds from the inability to think about land, independent land, as not only an integral part of our struggle for freedom but as an essential primary goal. For success of the struggle depends a great deal upon the support those of us who now opt for and are working to build an independent African nation on this soil, get from those of us who do not now choose for themselves the route of an independent nation. We calculate that those who do not now opt for independence may number as many as two~fifths of Our people. And the support of these people must be founded upon Understanding of what the New Africans are about. . . . The problem with international law is that there is nobody to enforce it except the powerful. Powerful nations enforce international law only when it suits them or when they are forced to.
Perhaps the best way for people to un-track their minds from the slaving inability to think of land as a real and legitimate goal of our struggle is to understandh how a people acquire claims to land. There is, of course, what we call the bandit rule of international law: that says, essentially, that if a people steals land and occupies it for a long time, the world will recognize that land as belonging to them. This, of course, is the manner in which the United States acquired claim to most of America: white folks simply stole it and held it. As a peopleWe Africans in America have been cowed by this rule; We have cringed before it (and before the power of the beast) as if it were the only rule of land possession. There is, fortunately, a civilized rule of land possession. It says that if a people has lived on a land traditionally, if they have worked and developed it, and if they have fought to stay there, that land is theirs. It isupon this rule of international law that Africans in America rest their claim for land in America. The essential strategy of our struggle for land is to array enough power ( as in jui-jitsu, with a concentration of karate strength at key moments) to force the greatest power, the United States, to abide by international law, to recognize and accept our claims to independence and land. The purpose of this strategy can be further simplified: it is to create a situation for the United States where it becomes cheaper to relinquish control of the Five States than to continue a war against us to take back or hold the area.
How do We accomplish such a thing? The implementing tactics are various, but they revolve around a set of supporting strategies first laid out by me in the short book War in America and further illuminated in another small book called Revolution and Nation-Building.
“We know whence the ‘start-money’ for the nation should come. It SHOULD come from the nation of our former slave masters, from the United States, whose wealth today is ALL derived, in essence, from the tri-cornered trade - that is to say, from the body and exploitation of the African slave. Repayments for this is what is known as reparations.
The principle of reparations is well established in international law. Nations pay reparations to nations. They pay reparations for the damage to each other, such as for accidental sinking of a ship in time of peace. They pay reparations for war: Germany to France, after World War I. They pay damages for crimes against people, for genocide: after World War II, for instance, Germany not only paid reparations to France for war, Germany paid reparations (over $800 million) to Israel for having slaughtered six million Jews not only during but before the war.
This last is particularly important to us, because the state of Israel, founded in 1948, did not even exist when the Nazis abused the Jews. The Jews used their reparations for economic development, as all reparations are intended to be used. New Africa’s use of reparations will be for precisely the same purpose. We have proposed a settlement to the United States federal government: $10,000 per individual descendant of slaves, some 300 billion dollars. (The US defense budget every year is well over 70 billion dollars.) Because of the special nature of our oppression and a belief within the RNA Government that economic development would best be advanced this way, we have proposed that 40% - $4,000 of the $10,000 - go directly to the individual.
From every state government with a black population, for demonstrable discrimination and oppression in the years after slavery, We are demanding $15,000 for every family which comes to a New African New Community in the South or already lives in the five states. All of this would be used to build the New Community ($7,500,000 for every community of 500 families).”
In 1973, republic of New Afrika President Imari Abubakari Obadele and Attorney Gaidi Obadele laid out the case for a plebiscite for African Americans in
THE ARTICLE THREE BRIEFS ESTABLISHING THE LEGAL CASE FOR THE EXISTENCE OF THE BLACK NATION THE REPUBLIC OF NEW AFRICA IN NORTH AMERICA
In May 1985, Imari Obadele submitted to the Temple University Graduate Board in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy
NEW AFRICAN STATE-BUILDING IN NORTH AMERICA: A Study of Reaction Under the Stress of Conquest
Nkechi Taifa writes in her memoir, Black Power, Black Lawyer,
"The spark for [the National Coalition of Blacks for Reparations in America - NCOBRA] founding emanated from a 1987 conference on Race and the Constitution spearheaded by the National Conference of Black Lawyers (NCBL) and held at Harvard University. . . . We also examined an act authorizing negotiations between a commission of the U.S. and a commission of the RNA to determine kind, dates and other details of paying reparations. We discussed the significance of 'government to government' reparations as the negotiated settlement that follows conclusion of war . . . . Out of that historic September 26, 1987 gathering, the National Coalition of Blacks for Reparation in America (NCOBRA) was born, bringing together diverse groups under one umbrella. Black Nationalist politics clearly dominated the room. . . . Since the creation of NCOBRA, the demand for reparations in the United States substantially leaped forward, generating what I've dubbed, the modern day Reparations Movement. It was the perfect storm. The Black Power Movement was open and receptive to a broad-based approach to further the issue of reparations. The Black legal community sanctioned the largely Black Nationalist effort . . . . I am appreciative that leaders in the New Afrikan Independence Movement had the humility to tone down their analysis and distinct ideological position in favor of facilitating broader acceptance of the concept of reparations and allowing new voices to come to the fore. " (pp. 174-179)
The REPARATIONS: A PROPOSED ACT TO STIMULATE ECONOMIC GROWTH IN THE UNITED STATES AND COMPENSATE, IN PART, FOR THE GRIEVOUS WRONGS OF SLAVERY AND THE UNJUST ENRICHMENT WHICH ACCRUED TO THE UNITED STATES THEREFROM prepared by President of the PGRNA Imari Obadele proposed the following, simple and logical formula for reparations:
1. One-third of the annual sum shall go directly to each individual;
2. One-third of the annual sum shall go directly to the duly elected government of the Republic of New Afrika and to any other state-building entity of New Afrikan people; and
3. One-third of the annual sum shall be paid directly to a National Congress of Organizations. And all of this to be framed and manifested through a PLEBISCITE.
It should be remembered that in Foundations of a Black Nation (1972), Imari Obadele stated,
“We know whence the ‘start-money’ for the nation should come. It SHOULD come from the nation of our former slave masters, from the United States
reparations: a proposed ACT TO STIMULATE ECONOMIC GROWTH IN THE UNITED STATES AND COMPENSATE, IN PART, FOR THE GRIEVOUS WRONGS OF SLAVERY AND THE UNJUST ENRICHMENT WHICH ACCRUED TO THE UNITED STATES THEREFROM
Today, several groups are now talking again about a plebiscite for New Afrikan Self Determination. Unfortunately, many of them do not have a proper understanding of the process nor the historical lessons of plebiscites in history. Of critical importance is understanding the very nature of a plebiscite - “the direct vote of all the members of an electorate on an important public question”.
To achieve an effective legal basis, a plebiscite traditionally must have a substantially significant majority participation [i.e. 90% of the adult New Afrikan people, or approximately 30 million people is ideal; a ⅔ majority vote in favor….], though there are exceptions. My personal opinion is that we are a decade, if not an entire generation, away from being able to reach this standard. However, should a source of substantial funding materialize - say through a multi-million dollar grant from a proposed Association of New Afrikan Professional Athletes for Self Determination or the Association of New Afrikan Celebrity Entertainers for Self Determination - it is possible, through a professional marketing campaign, to have a reasonable opportunity in perhaps three to five years. Participation of 1 to 5 million people is more reasonable, but this would require a different set of post plebiscite actions.
I believe that New Afrikans have both the personnel and technical knowledge capable of conducting the plebiscite, but lack a proper organizational apparatus within which to function. Were we to secure the funding, a bid soliciting a New Afrikan marketing firm to handle the marketing/education campaign should be advertised. Similarly, high officials from all the National Councils of the various black church denominations should be called into a National Council of Black Churches for Self Determination to handle the logistics of conducting the plebiscite as the churches themselves are the most likely locations for plebiscite voting. It is questionable whether or not registered New Afrikan polling officials of the Democratic and Republican parties can be brought in as plebiscite polling officials. However, if we are going to seriously attempt to reach the 90% participation standard, their participation would be required so as to give legitimacy to “unconscious” New Afrikans as well as to the international community. A so-called plebiscite of a 130,000 “conscious” Afro Descendants/New Afrikans will not be accepted as a legitimate direct vote of all the members of an electorate . . . .
A New Afrikan Plebiscite Civil Service Exam is being created and will be used to train staff who will be supervised and responsible for all the range of necessary activities before and after the plebiscite. In particular, a disciplined New Afrikan Plebiscite Diplomatic Corp will be needed (at least 1,000 people). I see this Corp as consisting of a Steering Committee composed of a Council of Elders and staffed by people who pass the New Afrikan Plebiscite Civil Service Exam. Both the Steering Committee and Diplomatic Corps will need full-time professional salaries in addition to travel expenses.
The small groups claiming to represent the “Afro Descendant” people talking about conducting a plebiscite to represent 50 million of us do not yet have the capacity in human and financial resoursces to conduct a proper campaign as outlined above to build consent which is a pre-requisite of a subsequent and successful plebiscite for Independence. A ton of educating still needs to be done. Towards that end, the following are some of the educational material included in the comprehensive training course for PREPARING FOR THE NEW AFRIKAN/AFRO DESCENDANT PLEBISCITE FOR SELF DETERMINATION IN THE UNITED STATES: FOUNDATIONAL KNOWLEDGE CONCERNING COLONIZATION AND THE EVOLUTION, RISKS, BENEFITS, PROCEDURES AND STRATEGIES FOR ESTABLISHING NATIONAL SOVEREIGNTY.
Different Elements and Parts of PG-RNA
The People’s Center Council (PCC)– Congress, National Legislature or Parliament is made up of District Representatives from PGRNA electoral districts across the U.S.A.
The People’s Revolutionary Leadership Council (PRLC) — A Cabinet headed by the National President, three National Vice Presidents, Ministries, Court System, and Other Govt. entities, including the Land Fund Committee, etc.
PG-RNA Cabinet in 1968:
1st President: Robert F. Williams (1925-1996) : He was in China 1966 to May 1968; Tanzania, May 1968 to Sept. 1969. 1st Vice President: Gaidi Obadele (Atty. Milton R. Henry) 2nd Vice President: Betty Shabazz (1934-1997) Minister of Information: Imari A. Obadele (Richard Bullock Henry) Minister of Health and Welfare: Queen Mother Moore (1899-1997) Minister of Education: Herman Ferguson Minister of State and Foreign Affairs: William Grant Minister of Defense: H. Rap Brown (now, Jalil Al Amin): He was also Minister of Justice for BPP in May 4, 1968 issue of The Black Panther. Co-Ministers of Culture: Imamu Amiri Baraka (LeRoi Jones), Maulana Karenga and Nana Oserjiman Adefumi Minister of Justice: Joan Franklin Minister of Finance: Raymond Willis Treasurer: Obaboa Owolo (Ed Bradley) Minister without Portfolio or Special Ambassador: Muhammad Ahmed (Maxwell Stanford)
PG-RNA Cabinet in 1969:
President: Robert F. Williams (1925-1997): He returned to U.S. (Detroit), Sept. 1969. (The Black Panther, Dec. 6, 1969; Jan. 3, 1970). 1st Vice President: Gaidi Obadele (Atty. Milton R. Henry) 2nd Vice President: Betty Shabazz (d. 1997) Minister of Education: Maulana Karenga: denounced and removed by PCC in Detroit, Apr. 5th. Herman B. Ferguson was afterwards appointed Minister of Education, East Coast Vice President, and acting director of Freedom Corps. Minister of State and Foreign Affairs: Wilbur Grattan Sr. Minister of Defense: Mwuesi Chui, commander of Black Legion
The “New Bethel Incident” took place in Detroit, Michigan, in March 31, 1969 during the First New Afrikan Nation Day Celebration at the New Bethel Baptist Church, on the West Side. One policeman killed and another wounded. Four Blacks wounded. Between 135 and 240 persons were arrested. Police later freed 125 persons [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_W._Crockett,_Jr. Criminal Court Judge George Crockett], frees 8 other Blacks. Chaka Fuller, Rafael Viera, and Alfred 2X Hibbets were charged with killing. All 3 were subsequent tried and acquitted. Chaka Fuller was mysterious assassinated a few months afterwards.
Southern Regional Minister of Defense: Jomo Kenyatta (Henry Hatches) Consul for Jackson, MS: Carolyn Williams April 2, 1969 – The New York BPP “21” arrested on conspiracy charges.
In 1969, a Newsweek magazine poll of Afrikans in the Northern U.S. showed that 27 percent of Afrikans under age thirty (and 18 percent of those over the age of thirty), wanted an independent Afrikan state.
PG-RNA Cabinet in 1970:
President: Imari A. Obadele Minister of Defense: Alajo Adegbalola (Leroy Boston) Dara Abubakaru (Virginia Collins)
PG-RNA Cabinet in 1971:
President: Imari Obadele , Minister of Defense: Alajo Adegbalola Minister of Information: Aisha Salim of Philadelphia Consul from Detroit: Chokwe Lumumba
Workers of the PG-RNA also announced that they would not permit those who opposed the peaceful plebiscite to shoot at them with impunity. The RNA cadres in Mississippi and elsewhere, in 1970 and 1971 were armed for self-defense.
March 5th, BPP sponsors a Day of Solidarity dedicated to “Freedom of Political Prisoners.”
On March 28th-Land Celebration Day-the RNA Capitol consecrated, Hinds County, Mississippi. Between 150 and 200 persons attended the dedication.
They used, and use, political means rather than military means. The United States Justice Department, instead of helping to organize the plebiscite; on 18 August 1971 a force of 60 FBI agents and 40 local Jackson police staged an armed attack on the official Government Residence (the main residence-office of the PG) in Jackson, Mississippi, supposedly to serve fugitive warrants on three RNA members (one being a FBI informant/agent provocateur). The seven people in the house were not wounded by the 20-minute barrage of bullets–a skirmish, but one police lieutenant died and another policeman and an FBI agent were wounded. Five young men and two young women at this house were captured, along with PG-RNA President, Imari Obadele, the Minister of Information and two others in a nearby office, and sent to jail.
The Suppressed History of New Africans Fighting For Independence- Haki Kweli Shakur
In the face of this unprovoked attack, three PG-RNA workers: Antar Ra, Maceo Sundiata (fsn Michael Finney) and Fela Sekou Olatunji (fsn Charles Hill) from the Bay Area, left in response to the call for Mississippi to provide support and defense for our assaulted movement. Clearly the U.S. had declared war on us! While driving east, the three were intercepted by a policeman whose aggressiveness caused his death. They then commandeered an airline and arrived in Cuba. They were granted asylum.
(On August 19th, FBI and police tried to assassinate President Imari Obadele.)
They are convicted two years later. Most served long years in jail. Their sovereign immunity demand was flatly rejected by the United States’ courts and executive branch, and no one was accorded treatment as a prisoner-of-war.
The Republic of New Afrika-Eleven (RNA-11): Citizens of the RNA: Imari Obadele; Hekima Ana and his wife, Tamu Ana, and Chumaimari Askadi (fsn Charles Stallings), all of Milwaukee; Karim Njabafudi (fsn Larry Jackson) of New Orleans; Tarik/Tawwab Nkrumah (fsn George Matthews) of Birmingham; Addis Ababa (fsn Dennis Shillingford) of Detroit; Offogga Qudduss (fsn Wayne Maurice James) and Njeri Qudduss, both of Camden, New Jersey; Spade de Mau Mau (fsn S. L. Alexander) of New Orleans; and Minister of Information Aisha Salim (fsn Brenda Blount) of Philadelphia.
PG-RNA Cabinet in 1972:
President: Gaidi Obadele Vice Presidents: Alajo Adegbalola, Chokwe Lumumba, Herman B. Ferguson New Afrikan Security Forces: Black Legion commander: Gen. Mwuesi Chui
In 1972, Ahmed Obafemi of New York had been sentenced on a gun charge clearly engineered by the F.B.I.’s Cointelpro. The F.B.I. succeeded in framing this key leader and officer of the RNA-PG. He was doing political work at the Democratic National Convention in Miami, Florida. Sentenced with him was Tarik Sonnebeyatta, of Camden, New Jersey. Brother Ahmed was jailed.
PG-RNA Cabinet in 1973:
Jan. 7, 1973 – Mark Essex, 23; is killed atop New Orleans hotel after killing 6 and wounding 15. Jan. 19th – One policeman killed and 2 wounded as Black freedom fighters seize a Brooklyn sporting goods store. May 2nd – Assata Shakur (fsn JoAnne Chesimard) wounded and Sundiata Acoli (fsn Clark Squire) arrested. Nov. 14th – Twyman Fred Myers, 23, BLA member, ambushed by FBI and New York police; was 6th BLA member killed in this fashion.
1975
PG-RNA Cabinet in 1980:
President: Imari Obadele A study conducted among Afrikan college students by Professor Luke Tripp which showed that 34 percent of the students favored an independent Afrikan state in North Amerika.
By the middle of 1980, because of public support and intense legal work, almost all of the RNA-11 (except for one) were set free and out of jail.
In the fall, some members of BLA, and some accused of being BLA personnel, had come under intense concentration by FBI and, principally, New York, New Jersey, and California police.
PG-RNA Cabinet in 1981:
President: Imari Obadele PCC Chairperson: Fulani Sunni-Ali
July 1983 – People’s Center Council (PCC) Meeting in Atlanta, Georgia, RNA National Territory.
Oct./Nov. 1984 – Third National New Afrikan Elections
Nov. 1985 – People’s Center Council (PCC) Meeting in Chicago, Illinois.
PG-RNA Cabinet in 1986:
President: Imari Obadele Minister of Justice: Nkechi Taifa Minister of Defense: Gen. Chui
July 1986 – People’s Center Council (PCC) Meeting in New Orleans, Louisiana, RNA National Territory.
July 1986 – People’s Center Council (PCC) Meeting in Detroit, Michigan.
Sept. 1986 – People’s Center Council (PCC) Meeting in Brooklyn, New York.
PG-RNA Cabinet in 1987:
President: Imari Obadele Minister of Justice: Nkechi Taifa
July 1987 – People’s Center Council (PCC) Meeting in Washington, DC (Banneker City).
Oct./Nov. 1987 – Fourth National New Afrikan Elections
Oct./Nov. 1990 – Fifth National New Afrikan Elections: Kwame Afoh elected president.
PG-RNA Cabinet in 1991:
President: Kwame Afoh PCC Chairperson: Imari Obadele
PG-RNA Cabinet in 1992:
President: Kwame Afoh PCC Chairperson: Imari Obadele
PG-RNA Cabinet in 1993:
President: Kwame Afoh PCC Chairperson: Imari Obadele
Nov. 1993 – National New Afrikan Elections: President Kwame Afoh re-elected.
In April 1994, several mainstream newspapers (New York Times, Washington Post, Chicago Sun-Times, and the Wall Street Journal) ran articles dealing with University of Chicago Professor Michael Dawson and Professor Ronald Brown of Wayne State University. The report concerned the findings of a random national survey of 1,206 Afrikans in the U.S., which in Dawson’s words showed ” a more radical Black America than existed even five years ago.” (Wall Street Journal). It found that fifty percent of Afrikans in the U.S. believe that our people are “a nation within a nation.”
Oct. 1996 – National New Afrikan Elections: President Kwame Afoh re-elected.
PG-RNA Cabinet in 1997:
President: Kwame Afoh PCC Chairperson: Marilyn Preston Killingham
PG-RNA Cabinet in 1998:
President: Kwame Afoh PCC Chairperson: Marilyn Preston Killingham
Oct./Nov. 1999 – National New Afrikan Elections
https://newafrikan77.wordpress.com/2014/08/18/republic-of-new-afrikan/
