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View From Here: We Won't Wait

David Mark Greaves
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View From Here By David Mark Greaves

We Won’t Wait

When de Blasio said “We won’t wait”, there was an assumption by the populace that he was speaking to them.  They were wrong.  Those that didn’t wait were the supporters of “stop-and-frisk” and the security state.  They got their guy in Commissioner Bill Bratton.   The real estate and financial community did not wait either and were comforted with the appointment of Goldman Sachs executive and former member of the Giuliani Administration, Alicia Glen, as Deputy Director of Housing and Economic  Development.

De Blasio’s first item on his agenda was expanding the Paid Sick Leave law.  That’s good, but it presupposes a job.   With unemployment in the African-American community running at 16-45% depending on who you’re counting, it’s not the top item on a community builder’s  “To-Do” list.    As for his call for Universal pre-K?   Something that would help the African-American community?  Well, we get pictures of his wife, Chirlane McCray, at the microphone with the mayor looking on admiringly, announcing that the campaign has been launched to get the New York State legislature to okay the necessary tax because this is something de Blasio can talk about but can’t do.  It does give him a “Progressive” pedestal to stand on as one who “takes stands”.   The African-American community gives him 96% of their vote and they get paid back in propaganda.

Now here is something the mayor, with his executive authority, can actually do.

He can tell the city agencies, the majority of which, according to the Comptroller’s M/WBE Report   Card, spend between 0.0% and 3.7% of their budgets with African-American firms, that that spending level is unacceptable and that they all should be striving for double digits.   That is something he can do to produce jobs, businesses and neighborhood stability.

And if he does not issue the edict himself, then it is something that members of the City Council can demand, push for and use some sharp elbows to fight for and take wearing the term “militant” on behalf of African-Americans as a badge of honor.

Speaking of a badge of honor, kudos to the Reverend Dr. Fred Lucas, senior pastor of the Brooklyn Community Church in Bedford-Stuyvesant, for his apt metaphor of New York City as a plantation.  Not a plantation of slavery days, where people were forced by the lash to work for no pay, but a city in which the income disparity is beginning to rival those days of old.  A city that spends less than 1% of its vendor budget with African-American firms and pretends to be shocked that African-American unemployment is so high.   A city that can stop-and-frisk but cannot prepare its youth for a future that is already here.   And now we have a whole new team and they call themselves “Progressives”, I think that means they are not Fascists and we should trust them and we do.   Now we don’t often get a chance to say good things about President Ronald Reagan, however his signature phrase “Trust but verify”, was so perfect when dealing with the Soviet Union that I think it’s a good one to use now, because that certainly is the intent.

Note to Borough President Eric Adams:   The Report Card also shows that in Jan-Dec 2013 the Brooklyn Borough President’s Office had an agency total of $4.9 million with 0.0% share going to M/WBE firms.   If that figure is correct (I mean damn, I was sure Marty would have bought something from some certified person), then this is an opportunity to demonstrate in a measurable way how new leadership in public office can be an asset to an African-American community looking to grow their businesses.

 

 

    

 

Pan Africanist and Cultural Leader John Watusi Branch Makes his Transition

Editor, Our Time Press
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The World African Diaspora Union (WADU) sends its deep-felt condolences to the immediate and extended family members of Baba John Watusi Branch. Baba J. Watusi Branch made his transition to the world of the ancestors at 7:00 a.m. on December 28, 2013. Baba Watusi Branch was a Pan-Africanist, a cultural leader, community builder, entrepreneur, activist, teacher, organizer and a father to our youth.

For Baba Branch, his journey from a hostile environment in New York to becoming an esteemed elder, and now a revered ancestor in the Pan-African movement, started with his youthful acceptance of African culture. Early in his life he became involved in the East Movement and Uhuru Sasa Pan-African school system promoting African culture as the basis for African liberation and Garvey Black nationalism. As these institutions evolved into the renowned contemporary International African Arts Festival in Brooklyn, Baba Watusi co-founded the Afrikan Poetry Theatre, Inc. (as a Center for African Culture).

Under his directorship, the Afrikan Poetry Theatre(APT) became the beacon for the promotion of multiple African art forms, including African drumming, dancing, languages, history, technology, poetry writing, news publication, etc. It also served the community with positive entertainment with local and internationally recognized artists, jazz bands, film festivals and theatrical performances from Africa, the Caribbean and Afro-Latino. Additionally, it was a center for African immigration issues, helping the homeless and African employment. Further, the center became an African home to many seekers of African wisdom and work, especially the youth. Baba Watusi was a pioneer in organizing regular cultural and business tours to Africa. His contribution on these tours have led to thousands of Africans from the Diaspora visiting and repatriating to Africa and contributing billions of dollars to the economy of Africa.

With his great leadership of the APT, Baba Watusi helped to foster the Pan-African, civil rights and the Black Nationalist movements with his regular invitation of critical leaders to the center. Some of these key leaders and scholar activists were  Kwame Ture (Stokely Carmichael), Dr. John Henrik Clarke, Dr. Maulana Karenga, Dr. Amos Wilson, Minister Louis Farrakhan, Elombe Brath, Dr. Ben Jochannan, Dr. Charshee McIntyre, Dr. Ishakamusa Barashongo, Reverend Herbert Daughtry, Attorney Alton Maddox, Dr. Molefe Asante,  Viola Plummer, Drs. Leonard and Roslyn Jeffries, and Dr. Ron Daniels.  Also, he has had African and Caribbean ambassadors, elected officials, major faith leaders and youth leaders to speak and organize around critical local and global issues, programs and projects affecting African people.

By the 1990’s, he had pioneered another visionary effort, which was to build a Pan-African entrepreneurship group to foster African Diaspora business initiatives across Africa. This group, called Africa Trade and Business Assistance (ATABA), became a 21stcentury model for Pan-African self-determined business initiatives and projects in Africa. Because of his profound contributions to the African world movement, at the opening of the 21st century, he was tapped to be an advisor on the African Union (AU) Diaspora initiative, which started in 2003. Under his guidance, support and then his leadership, the World African Diaspora Union (WADU) was established by 2007 and he became the Chief of the Secretariat in 2008. During his tenure, Watusi exemplified high levels of leadership advocating key Diaspora initiatives for African continental dual citizenship, reparations, repatriation, economic partnership and African culture and philosophy as the basis for a Pan-African government.

Before his transition, he urged for greater financial support for the Afrikan Poetry Theatre. The APT has been severely mal-affected by the recent economic depression across the Black global communities. He also urged greater participation of a new generation of leaders in the global African movement, especially in Africa. Finally, he was very concerned with the direction of the cultural movement, especially the rollback on African education and on significant cultural programs such as Kwanzaa. Baba John Watusi Branch was, and is, the spiritual embodiment of an African with profound love, an authentic legacy and an uncompromising loyalty to African people. MORE TO FOLLOW, Peace and blessings!

Minister P.D. Menelik Harris

Secretary General, WADU

Bed-Stuy Crime Down But Increasing Wealth Disparity Could Alter Trends

Stephen Witt
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Crown Heights sees crime rise amid increasing mix of gentrification and poverty

By Stephen Witt

Major crime continued to fall throughout Bedford-Stuyvesant in 2013, according to Police Department statistics, but there are some troubling blips in violent crime that could point to a challenge to keep crime down under the incoming de Blasio Administration.

In the 79th Precinct, which covers the bulk of Bed-Stuy, overall felony crime is down 11 percent for the year. However, both murder and rape have shown increases.

As of Dec. 22, there have been 13 reported murders for the year as compared to 11 at this time in 2012. There have been 25 reported rapes this year as compared to 18 at this time last year, which is an increase of 39 percent.

On the other side, violent crime such as robbery is down over 18 percent with 383 reported crimes as compared to 469 at this time last year. Reported felony assault is down 9 percent with 460 reported incidents thus far this year as compared to 506 at this time in 2012.

Related to violent crime, both shooting incidents and shooting victims are down over 20 percent for the year.

The nonviolent felony crime of burglary is down 29 percent while both grand larceny and auto theft is up very slightly.

In the 81st Precinct, overall felony crime fell 5.3 percent and violent crime has been greatly reduced. There have been six reported murders this year within the confines of the precinct compared to 16 at this time last year for a 62.5 percent decrease, while reported rape is about flat with 18 reported thus far in 2013 as compared to 19 at this time last year.

Conversely, reported felony assault is up 18.5 percent with 352 incidents so far in 2013 as compared to 297 at this time last year. Robbery is down three percent for the year.

Both shooting victims (down 23 percent) and shooting incidents (down 27 percent) have also fallen dramatically.

Also seeing drastic decreases are burglary (down 26 percent) and auto theft (down 22 percent), while grand larceny has fallen slightly.

While overall crime is down in Bed-Stuy for the year, several precincts covering Central Brooklyn have seen slight increases. This includes the 77th Precinct, which covers the northern part of Crown Heights bordering Bed-Stuy where felony crime is up nearly 14 percent. This includes double-digit percentage increases in the violent crimes of murder, rape, felony assault and robbery.

Interestingly, this precinct also covers the increasingly gentrified enclaves of Prospect Heights and Crown Heights, where long food pantry lines are sometimes seen across the street from trendy eateries.

Crime is also up slightly (3.38 percent) in East New York’s 75th Precinct.

Brooklyn Movement Center Incubates a Food Co-op

Editor, Our Time Press
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It’s harvest time in central Brooklyn!  A rich marriage of food wisdom and social activism continues to yield nutrient-packed produce and local leadership right here.  The Brooklyn Movement Center (BMC) wades these waters with unique activities while incubating something new.  We saw how at one of the grub parties posted at their Web site.  Food Justice organizer Harvir Kaur hosted this lively meal filled with great conversation.

Cultivating neighborhood leadership to run an independent food business is one of three Food Justice projects at BMC.  The emerging Central Brooklyn People’s Food Co-op seeks to embody health, affordability and justice.  They also seek your participation.  It’s crucial to BMC that the community own this important venture!

Grub Party hosted by Brooklyn Movement Center
Brooklyn Movement Center

Harvir opened the night with an overview.  Along with others committed to the cause, she explained that food co-ops are a way for neighborhoods to control their access to healthy food.  Because they are largely volunteer-run, they can provide a less expensive alternative to supermarkets.  Food co-ops are committed to consumer education, product quality and member control.  If this one follows existing BK models, it’s likely to offer produce from (established) nearby community gardens.

Serving Bedford-Stuyvesant, North Crown Heights and surrounding low- and moderate-income neighborhoods of color is the goal.  They, and partners, want to improve local food options by establishing a new community-based and membership-run food cooperative.

Who are the BMC?  The Brooklyn Movement Center is a membership-led, direct action, community group based in Bed-Stuy. They exist to unite residents to identify important local issues, win concrete community improvements, and build power. The BMC is staffed by local organizers, supported by volunteers, governed by a community-based board of directors with guidance from an advisory board composed of citywide activists and organizers.  Get involved by calling 718-771-7000.

Furthermore: You can find your local genius on issues of food at www.brooklynmovementcenter.org where tour de force blogs cover a wide range of related issues.  Committing to Food Justice Means Committing to Criminal Justice (and vice versa) dropped on 8-28-13 in partnership with the Center for Nu Leadership on Urban Solutions.  This story asks and suggests answers to the question, How do Food Justice and Criminal Justice intersect?  Got GMOs? was contributed by Food and Water Watch’s Brooklyn office.  That informative piece gives local and national perspectives on why we need genetically modified foods labeled.  It tells us GMOs are pushed into the marketplace by familiar and little-known corporations.  Naming names, it reads: “…junk food peddlers like Coca-Cola, Nestle, PepsiCo, General Mills, ConAgra and the like want to keep us dining in the dark…”  Dara Cooper of the NYC Food and Fitness Partnership based at Bed-Stuy Restoration reblogged her Truthout magnum opus here, too.  In Criminalization, Race and Food Access in a Time of Hyper-Afrophobia, Dara breaks it down: “Black and brown people deserve the right to LIFE, liberty and the ability to pursue happiness.  Black and brown people deserve the right to access quality food.  Those rights are connected.”  The process of birthing a new food co-op means the BMC’s in this game long-term.  Check their Web site for more.

Africans in the Americas Pt 1

David Mark Greaves
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We Came Before Columbus

By David Mark Greaves

The first explorers from Africa arrived on the north and south equatorial currents spanning the Atlantic Ocean between the African and American continents. Dr. Ivan Van Sertima points to these forces as a natural conveyor belt between West Africa and the Americas. The most striking physical evidence of Africans are the distinctively Negroid stone heads of the Olmec civilization. Dr. Van Sertima reports that the archaeological context in which they were found has been radiocarbon dated to 800 B.C. To judge the impact of that African presence, Van Sertima tells us this: “At the sacred center of the Olmec culture-La Venta-about eighteen miles inland from the Gulf of Mexico which flows into the Atlantic, there stood four colossal Negroid heads, six to nine feet high, weighing up to forty tons each. They stood in large squares or plazas in front of the most colorful temple-platforms, the sides and floors of which were of red, yellow and purple. They stood twelve to twenty times larger than the faces of living men. They were like gods among the Olmecs.

“In this center of La Venta there were great altars. One of these (known as the third altar) was made out of one of the Negroid heads, flattened on top for that purpose. A speaking tube was found to go in at the ear and out at the mouth so that the figure could function as a talking oracle … ”

What kind of respect for a human spirit does that suggest? Science fiction writer Isaac Asimov has said, “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic”. The Africans of 800 B.C. would indeed have seemed as magicians to a culture that was not familiar with knowledge coming from Nubian-Egyptian civilizations that were ancient, even at that time.

Other Africans came later.

Van Sertima tells us there is the African gravesite dated 1250 A.D., found in Reef Bay Valley on the island of St. John’s in the Virgin Islands. There is a Mandingo head of fourteenth century Mexico, which may be all that is left of the vision of Abubakari, the Second Emperor of Mali. His was a land where “Thousands of Arab and Egyptian caravans passed every year through Timbuktu and Niani. He stood on the western shore of his empire and sent forth two expeditions totaling 2,400 ships to discover the limits of the sea, circa 13 A.D. For Abubakari, his empire ended  at the sea that had stopped Alexander the Great but it would not stop this emperor of the largest empire on earth. He was so passionate in his belief in a world beyond the sea that he led the second expedition him-self. Van Sertima, reporting from oral histories that have been passed down to this day, writes: ” … One day, dressed in a flowing white robe and a jeweled turban, he took leave of Mali and set out with his fleet down the Senegal, heading west across the Atlantic, never to return. He took his griot and half his history with him.” What a tale that griot could tell if we could hear him now.

Because Abubakari never returned to Africa, this gravesite might be evidence that he stretched his empire farther than was known at that time.  Christopher Columbus heard the stories, now common along the African coast, of a New World across the sea. Arriving in the Americas in the 1490’s, he was in time to see African settlements, speak of African artifacts in letters and hear stories from native villagers of the Africans who had preceded him.

By the 1700’s, African civilizations had fallen and Europeans began using Africans as work animals to be captured in Africa packed and shipped for a months-long Middle Passage across the Atlantic and sold in the Americas to work the wealth from the land the Europeans were taking from  native people. During this period, Africans came not as adventuring seamen, but brought as chattel.

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