http://archive.prisonradio.org/audio/mumia/2005maj/NOV05/11-18-05polp.mp3
Statement in support of International Day of Solidarity
This International Day of Solidarity with Political Prisoners shows us that while repression is national, resistance can be global.
In truth, it must be so. Many of us have been part of national liberation movements, revolutionary political parties, anti-racist communes, or, in the case of people like the Cuban 5, anti-terrorism activists. We have been tried in tribunals where our politics have been our crime, and our political associations our felonies. This, in nations which claim to support the right of free association.
But the truth of the matter is that nations are not bound by law, but by power. It doesn’t matter what is written in arcane, ancient documents. It doesn’t matter, truthfully, what treaties or pacts have been sworn to, or signed.
Treaties and constitutions are sheer conveniences, ignored more often than followed.
This is my position based on my studies of history, law, and political (and also international) affairs.
Political prisoners and prisoners of war should accept that truth, perhaps use it in political organizing, but not rely upon it. That’s because many imprisoned activists and revolutionaries refer to international law principles when they protest either their incarceration or their conditions of confinement.
What can such an argument mean in an era when the (U.S.) Attorney General refers to the Geneva Conventions as “quaint.”
Law isn’t something that simply exists, up in the air, like the moon. Law is an instrument of the ruling class, and it can only be impacted by social forces which struggle to change, or transform social relations.
What that means, in a nutshell, is relatively simple: organize. Organize. Organize.
Many of us began our activism in an age when we claimed to “believe in the people.” We should therefore, as much as possible, believe in them anew. Speak to them. Write to them. Work with them.
Organize.
There are no shortcuts, especially for those who rebel in the heart of the Empire.
We live in an age of secret prisons, what a British jurist called recently, “legal black holes.”
We have therefore seen, with our eyes, the death (if not the interment!) of America’s “reverence” and adherence to the Constitution.
Those of us who remember the COINTELPRO era have lived long enough to see many of those same illegalities and violations made into law! Many of us who count our radicalization in the fires of the Vietnam War, have been around long enough to see another imperial adventure, begun in lies, and ripened into social resistance to the Iraq war.
Many of us can speak to those realities, from our specific movement experiences. There is space for us to write, to call, to speak, and hopefully, to touch others in the process of reaching and radicalizing them, as we were radicalized.
We must pass it on! So that another generation doesn’t know more about a 50 Cent, than Huey P. Newton!
So that young people will create a culture that doesn’t say, “Get Rich or Die Tryin’” but “Get Free or Die Tryin”!.”
That is our collective challenge. If we can do this, we will give arms, and legs; hearts, and minds; bodies and souls to the Movement to create true international solidarity with political prisoners, prisoners of war, and political detainees.
This is our duty.
This is our Responsibility.
This is our work, to remake the world, in a more life-affirming, humanistic vision.
Ona Move! Long Live John Africa! From Death Row, this is Mumia Abu-Jamal.
This International Day of Solidarity with Political Prisoners shows us that while repression is national, resistance can be global.
In truth, it must be so. Many of us have been part of national liberation movements, revolutionary political parties, anti-racist communes, or, in the case of people like the Cuban 5, anti-terrorism activists. We have been tried in tribunals where our politics have been our crime, and our political associations our felonies. This, in nations which claim to support the right of free association.
But the truth of the matter is that nations are not bound by law, but by power. It doesn’t matter what is written in arcane, ancient documents. It doesn’t matter, truthfully, what treaties or pacts have been sworn to, or signed.
Treaties and constitutions are sheer conveniences, ignored more often than followed.
This is my position based on my studies of history, law, and political (and also international) affairs.
Political prisoners and prisoners of war should accept that truth, perhaps use it in political organizing, but not rely upon it. That’s because many imprisoned activists and revolutionaries refer to international law principles when they protest either their incarceration or their conditions of confinement.
What can such an argument mean in an era when the (U.S.) Attorney General refers to the Geneva Conventions as “quaint.”
Law isn’t something that simply exists, up in the air, like the moon. Law is an instrument of the ruling class, and it can only be impacted by social forces which struggle to change, or transform social relations.
What that means, in a nutshell, is relatively simple: organize. Organize. Organize.
Many of us began our activism in an age when we claimed to “believe in the people.” We should therefore, as much as possible, believe in them anew. Speak to them. Write to them. Work with them.
Organize.
There are no shortcuts, especially for those who rebel in the heart of the Empire.
We live in an age of secret prisons, what a British jurist called recently, “legal black holes.”
We have therefore seen, with our eyes, the death (if not the interment!) of America’s “reverence” and adherence to the Constitution.
Those of us who remember the COINTELPRO era have lived long enough to see many of those same illegalities and violations made into law! Many of us who count our radicalization in the fires of the Vietnam War, have been around long enough to see another imperial adventure, begun in lies, and ripened into social resistance to the Iraq war.
Many of us can speak to those realities, from our specific movement experiences. There is space for us to write, to call, to speak, and hopefully, to touch others in the process of reaching and radicalizing them, as we were radicalized.
We must pass it on! So that another generation doesn’t know more about a 50 Cent, than Huey P. Newton!
So that young people will create a culture that doesn’t say, “Get Rich or Die Tryin’” but “Get Free or Die Tryin”!.”
That is our collective challenge. If we can do this, we will give arms, and legs; hearts, and minds; bodies and souls to the Movement to create true international solidarity with political prisoners, prisoners of war, and political detainees.
This is our duty.
This is our Responsibility.
This is our work, to remake the world, in a more life-affirming, humanistic vision.
Ona Move! Long Live John Africa! From Death Row, this is Mumia Abu-Jamal.
