THERE ARE POLITICAL PRISONERS IN THE UNITED STATES

THERE ARE POLITICAL PRISONERS IN THE UNITED STATES
By Naji Mujahid
Leonard Peltier, Sundiata Acoli, Marshall ‘Eddie’ Conway, Imam Jamil Al-Amin, Mutulu Shakur, Sekou Odinga, Ruchell Magee…….. Do any of these names ring a bell? Probably not; they are what many consider to be Political Prisoners/Prisoners of War (PPs/POWs). They are not in Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Russia, China, or any other sovereign State that the United States would have us believe is undemocratic, evil, or backward. In fact, these individuals can be found languishing in the prisons of Federated States such as Maryland, Colorado, California, and New York. However, the United States does not acknowledge the presence of any (PPs/POWs) within its borders.
What is a Political Prisoner? The Special International Tribunal on the Violation of Human Rights of Political Prisoners and Prisoners of War in United States Prisons and Jails which convened on December 7 - 10, 1990 at Hunter College in New York City defined political prisoner as “a person incarcerated for actions carried out in support of legitimate struggles for self-determination or for opposing the illegal policies of the [United States] government and/or its political sub-divisions”. Moreover, it described prisoners of war as “those combatants struggling against colonial and alien domination and racist regimes captured as prisoners” and posited that they are “to be accorded the status of prisoners of war and their treatment should be in accordance with the provisions of the Geneva Conventions Relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War, of 12 August 1949. (General Assembly Resolution 3103 (XXVIII)).”

The aforementioned PPs and those like them have not only been denied acknowledgement as such, but they have been cast as common criminals and thereby the legitimacy of their struggle for self- determination has been denied. Self-determination is a human right codified in Article 1, paragraph 1 of the International Covenant for Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant for Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights. It is the right of the people to “freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social, and cultural development”.

Negros, Blacks, African-Americans, or whatever the proper nomenclature may be, have been systematically denied this right since their collective introduction to the Western Hemisphere by European slave traders. Since that time, as the United States has evolved the relationship of African descendents to the power structure has remained constant. Blacks in the US are an exploited class of people perpetually disadvantaged by their origins; truly an internal colony within the US. The extent of this is further manifested by the absence of any real restorative action, such as reparations, taken by the government.

Concomitantly, any actions taken by the people, to either force a redress of grievances or produce a self-interested solution to the inherited problems has been attacked and treated as a criminal matter. Just as the Supreme Court decision in the Dred Scott case determined that “Blacks had no rights that Whites were bound to respect” the Black Panther Party was labeled as “public enemy number one” by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the nation’s federal police force, in 1968. This designation led to increased repression by the Bureau and other national, state, and local agencies; to date, there are scores of individuals (Black, White, Native American, Puerto Rican, and others) still in prison, many in horrendous conditions.

Illustrative of the aforementioned repression are the cases of Geronimo Pratt, Dhoruba Bin-Wahad, and Fred Hampton. Pratt was the leader of the BPP in Los Angeles and Hampton the leader in Chicago. In early December of 1969, within days of each other, police raided Hampton’s home and the LA Panther office where Pratt slept. In both cases, highly placed FBI informants within both chapters supplied the police with floor plans and other information about both locations. In the case of Hampton, the FBI agent drugged him and Defense Minister Mark Clark with a substance that induced sleep. When the raids occurred, it was done with guns blazing; the police shot through walls where the suspected Panther’s were, there was no warrant and no suspected crime, they were coming for blood. Their idea was to initiate a gun battle and use it for justification to arrest survivors. There were no casualties in LA, but in Chicago, Fred Hampton and Mark Clark were both killed in their sleep and Hampton’s pregnant wife was arrested. In LA, there were no casualties and, in fact, the Panthers were able to engage the police in a 4 hour shootout. They surrendered after the public and press had gathered. Of course, they were arrested, but the only charge that the police could get to stick was a minor conspiracy to possess illegal weapons charge; the 13 that were arrested were all acquitted of conspiracy to assault or murder police officers.

Three years later, Pratt was framed by the FBI for an unsolved murder that occurred in 1968. Subsequently, he did 27 years until he was able to prove that the FBI had set him up and he was released. Similarly, Dhoruba Bin-Wahad, who was a prominent figure in the New York BPP chapter, was indicted for the attempted murder of two police officers in 1971. At this time the NYPD and FBI were involved in a joint operation called “Newkill”. Bin-Wahad was convicted and did 19 years before he was able to prove that the FBI set him up and he was acquitted of the charges.

History proves that US citizens who actively oppose government policy and institutionalized social and economic disparities become likely targets for disruption, destruction, and neutralization. Those who still languish in prison have not been as fortunate as Pratt and Bin-Wahad to be able to prove that they were set up, but in those two cases there is clear proof that set-ups occur. Moreover, in the FBI files of their Counter Intelligence Program (COINTELPRO) and the Senate Church Committee Reports (97-455) there is proof that it happens. Martin Luther King, Jr. the Nobel Peace Prize Laureate and famous pacifist was arrested 16 times, possibly more, and later assassinated. If he was not dead, quite possibly, he would be in prison. It is a travesty that a country that so fervently promotes the ideals of freedom, has allowed for sincere freedom fighters to be locked away for decades and forgotten. Meanwhile, the election of a Black man as President is widely considered indicative of a change in American social values. Barak Obama, as intelligent and charismatic as he may be, does not represent change. The true representatives of change are in prison.