35th ANNIVERSARY OF THE BLACK PANTHER PARTY
With great fear for this nation
and greater anger for its direction, I hail and
salute the 35th Anniversary of the founding of the
Black Panther Party. The four years I spent at the
helm of the Party’s paper were four of the most
valuable years of my long, activist life. That life
began as a 2nd Lieutenant in the U.S. Infantry in
the Philippines at the close of World War II, in
the streets of Manila demanding to go home; an activism
that continues to this day in my 77th year.
The fear and anger I feel today
is fed by the nearly thirty of those years spent
living, working and playing in Egypt in North Africa
and in Ghana in West Africa. There, through the
1960s, I witnessed and was a part of the coming
to political independence of one African nation
after another using all means necessary. And I also
witnessed and was a part of the residual and continuing
horrors of colonial exploitation of the natural
and human resources of a rich and bountiful continent
of ancient and proud peoples.
When I came home in 1972, like a
magnet, I was drawn to Oakland where I believed
I would be welcomed and might be needed. I was right.
Without knowing me personally, but honoring the
name and legacy I bore and the years of first-hand
liberation experience on the African continent that
I came to them with, Huey and Bobby welcomed me
like a brother-comrade and gave me carte-blanch
authority to edit and guide the Party paper. The
Party comrades with whom I worked over those three
years will attest to my loyalty, to my total commitment
and to my devotion.
The fear and anger I feel today
as I watch the nation react to September 11, is
fed by what I know of the utter ignorance of the
American people of the truth of what is happening
in the world around them. It is fed by the first
hand knowledge I have of the Corporate U.S. media’s
refusal to inform Americans of what is happening
outside these shores. Its selection of only that
which makes the U.S. look good on the one hand and
what makes that world of peoples of color - - the
developing nations and peoples of Central and South
America and the Caribbean, all Africa, the Middle
East, Asia, the Pacific Islanders and the indigenous
peoples of Australia and New Zealand, some four-fifth
of humanity - - look bad. That world that for at
least four Centuries was both the playground and
the exploitation fields that made Europe rich and
powerful..
As Editor of the Black Panther Party
weekly newspaper I had the great opportunity and
responsibility of telling the hidden truths of what
was happening to people of color in the US and around
the world. During my three years we utilized my
contacts on the African continent to tell our readers
also the truth of the great liberation struggles
sweeping the African continent; struggles that the
mainstream media either ignored, lied about when
they could not be ignored and always and consistently
distorted.
The nations that have pledged direct
military contributions to the US. armed aggressions
against Afghanistan, one of the poorest nations
of peoples of color in the world, are Britain, France,
Germany, Australia, Canada and New Zealand. Is this
Bush’s "coalition" to fight terrorism?"
Is this that "international community"
so often referred to in their rhetoric?
My fear and my anger arises from
the fact that the worlds’ peoples of color are today
being challenged by the centers of power and wealth
in Europe and North America. The gauntlet has been
thrown down - - in Afghanistan. It is being taken
up by peace loving, justice seeking, courageous
and proud peoples everywhere. There may yet be awful
devastation. But, W.E.B. Du Bois said it nearly
a Century ago: "Most (wo) men in this world
are colored. A belief in humanity means a belief
in colored (wo) men. The future world will, in all
reasonable probability be what colored (wo) men
make it."
David Graham Du Bois
Editor - Black Panther Intercommunal
Service from August, 1972 to December, 1976
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