[Pnews] NY - Saturday’s 21st Annual Freedom Fighter Dinner Tribute

[Prisoner News]

http://amsterdamnews.com/news/2017/mar/02/saturdays-21st-annual-freedom-fighter-dinner-tribu/ 



  Saturday’s 21st Annual Freedom Fighter Dinner Tribute


            *Nayaba Arinde*
            <http://amsterdamnews.com/staff/nayaba-arinde/> | 3/2/2017

Some grassroots activists had hoped that by January this year former 
President Barack Obama would have addressed, if not released, some of 
the nation’s decades-long serving political prisoners on his way out of 
the White House. Perhaps the likes of Mumia Abu Jamal, or the Move 9, or 
Veronza Bowers, or Seth Hayes, or Jalil Muntaqim.

Alas, it was not to be, except for a joyous Oscar Rivera, who was 
released after spending 35 years and eight months in U.S. prisons.

Still, the fight continues for dedicated advocates and supporters of men 
and women imprisoned, some say, largely because of their Black Panther, 
Black liberation and Black self-determining efforts in the 1960s and 
1970s. In that regard, The Malcolm X Commemoration Committee is 
organizing the 21st Annual Freedom Fighter Dinner Tribute in Harlem 
Saturday, March 4, 2017.

“When we say ‘Black Resistance Matters: No Surrender, No Retreat,’ it’s 
because neither our captured freedom fighters, their families or the 
Movement lawyers and doctors we will be honoring have done so,” dequi 
kioni sadiki (sic) told the Amsterdam News.

The chair of the MXCC added, “This year we honor a number of unsung 
legal warriors who have always been there in court, representing our 
freedom fighters to the fullest: Jill Soffiyah Elijah, Joan Gibbs, 
Florence Morgan, Bob Boyle, Michael Tarif Warren, Nkechi Taifa, Susan 
Tipograph, Lynne Stewart and Eve Rosahn.”

Panther-Zulu King Sadiki “Bro. Shep” Ojore Olugbala noted, “In Panther 
language, these lawyers are ‘people’s’ lawyers, or lawyers who have 
committed themselves to serving our struggle for our liberation and to 
social justice out of their own love for the people.

“These cases are not the kind of cases that bring lawyers celebrity 
status, wealth or fame to their profiles and in fact, it is just the 
opposite. They face and subject themselves to professional hostility 
just as our people face institutional hostility for daring to challenge 
unjust manner of this order and their prosecution and persecution of our 
freedom fighters. It can have its own set of dire consequences for them 
and we need to appreciate them for that as an oppressed community.”

MXCC Press Officer Zayid Muhammad stated, “This year’s dinner tribute 
not only comes on the heels of the loss of two political prisoners, 
Abdullah Majid and Mondo Wa Langa, needlessly dying in custody while 
still trying to clear their names, but it also comes on the heels of 
outgoing President Barack Obama deciding not to grant clemency to 
federal political prisoners Veronza Bowers and Dr. Mutulu Shakur and 
deciding not to posthumously clear Marcus Garvey, our first political 
prisoner.”

“Over 150 years has collectively been served by these brave men thanks 
to COINTELPRO, and look at how this ended,” said dequi kioni sadiki. 
“Facing circumstances like these are almost impossible without committed 
lawyers like those who we will honor.”

Organizers have decried the fact that most recently Obama and a variety 
of governors have denied petitions of the likes of long-held political 
prisoners such as Shakur, Leonard Peltier, Jalil Al Amin and Jamal, who 
is in poor health.

This dinner (now co-sponsored by the National Alumni Association of the 
Black Panther Party), was established 21 years ago by Iyaluua Ferguson, 
wife of late co-founder and chairman emeritus, Herman Ferguson. This 
year the event will be held at the Adam Clayton Powell State Office 
Building (163 W. 125th St. at Adam Clayton Powell Boulevard, Third 
Floor). Dinner will be served at 4 p.m., and the libation at 5 p.m. 
Organizers say that all proceeds go to the commissary accounts of the 
political prisoners represented at the dinner.

The cultural presenters to perform at this year’s tribute will include 
Harlem’s own elder musician statesman of the spoken word Bro. Ngoma and 
Universal Zulu Nation DJ and revolutionary conscious hip-hop artist 
“Spirit Child & The New Black Arts Movement.”

Tickets for this event are $40 in advance and $45 at the door.

For more information, call 718-512-5008 or email mxcc519 at verizon.net.

-- 
Freedom Archives 522 Valencia Street San Francisco, CA 94110 415 
863.9977 www.freedomarchives.org
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://freedomarchives.org/pipermail/ppnews_freedomarchives.org/attachments/20170302/ab199d3a/attachment.htm>