Socialist Action /April 1999
Support Grows for Mumia and April 24
By JEFFMACKLER
Support is building for the April 24 mobilizations in Philadelphia and
San Francisco for award-winning journalist, death row political prisoner,
and former Black Panther, Mumia Abu-Jamal.
In a new development, it has been announced that the San Francisco march
and rally will be led by the International Longshore and Warehouse Union
(ILWU).
With over 100 delegates present representing every longshore local from
the Mexican to the Canadian borders of the United States, the union's March
26 San Francisco convention voted almost unanimously to conduct an eight-hour
"stop work meeting" of the union's 8000 members.
The union resolved to "support the San Francisco demonstration and
mobilize our membership on the coast to participate by coordinating our
April stop work meetings for the 24th to demand, 'Stop the Execution! Free
Mumia!'"
Contingents of longshore workers from San Diego to Billingham, Wash.,
marching with their local banners, will lead the April 24 San Francisco
component of the national mobilization.
The ILWU voted to "appeal to our fellow longshore workers in Philadelphia
[the site of the simultaneous April 24 East Coast march] to join in this
national protest." No ships on the Western seaboard will be worked
from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. on April 24.
The ILWU contract allows for one "stop work meeting" yearly.
These are usually organized to discuss contract issues and other business
the ILWU deems important.
ILWU president Brian McWilliams will address the 1:00 pm Civic Center
rally for Mumia. The ILWU will bus its Bay Area members from the union headquarters
to the assembly site at Dolores Park.
Additional labor support was demonstrated when the delegates to the 35,000-member
California Federation of Teachers state convention voted to support a new
trial for Mumia and urged their members to participate on April 24.
Hundreds of buses and car caravans have been organized to transport participants
to the April 24 coordinated rallies in Philadelphia and San Francisco.
The New York City-based Millions for Mumia April 24 organizing center
announced that 100 buses have been reserved by its coalition and by supporting
trade unions.
Across the country, buses are being filled-from Portland, Seattle, Los
Angeles, Baltimore, Washington, Boston, Minneapolis, and other cities. Hundreds
of campus committees have chartered buses to join the bicoastal rallies.
The Philadelphia rally is set for City Hall at 1 p.m. There will be a
march through the center city.
International support
New support for Mumia has been gained in several other countries. In
Hamburg, Germany, over 5000 participated in a Feb. 20 mass march demanding
his freedom. The march was joined by thousands of Kurds who chanted for
Mumia and protested the U.S.-abetted kidnapping of Kurdish leader Abdullah
Ocalan.
The Brazilian Union of Education Workers in the state of Rio de Janeiro
voted to conduct two state-wide one-hour work stoppages, "to carry
out ... meetings to demand freedom for Mumia Abu-Jamal."
The case of Mumia Abu-Jamal has forced its way into the pages of the
nation's leading newspapers. The March 9, 1999, New York Times carried
a feature article on the growing campaign against the death penalty.
The Times observed that "Mumia's cause, emblazoned on posters
across the country, has attracted the interest of celebrities round the
world."
A generally favorable four-page article in the weekly Boston Phoenix,
titled, "There's Something About Mumia," noted that "Abu-Jamal's
advocates have shown a remarkable ability to cultivate support, especially
among youth."
The growing support for Mumia is fueled by a political environment where
police brutality, frameups, and murder have been exposed to millions as
being the norm in American society rather then the isolated exception.
Daily demonstrations in New York City have scored the racist police department
for its cold-blooded murder of 22-year-old Guinean immigrant Amadou Ahmed
Diallo.
Indeed, the open racism and criminal actions of police, prosecutors,
and city officials, in the past consciously concealed by the corporate press,
has reached such proportions that coverups can no longer be organized with
impunity.
A recent article in the Chicago Tribune is a case in point. The
article is titled, "Study: D.A.s lie, conceal evidence to win cases,"
and subtitled, "Of 381 verdicts overturned, 67 defendants had faced
execution."
It begins, "With impunity, prosecutors across the country have violated
their oaths and the law, committing the worst kinds of deception in the
most serious of cases.
"They have persecuted Black men, hiding evidence the real killers
were white. They have persecuted a wife, hiding evidence her husband committed
suicide. ... They do it to win. They do it because they won't get punished.
They have done it to defendants who came within hours of being executed,
only to be exonerated."
There is growing understanding in the United States that justice in capitalist
America is a commodity available only to the rich and powerful. Mumia's
case has united a diverse and broad range of forces who have come to question
the myth of American democracy and fair play.
The overwhelming evidence accumulated by his defense team that demonstrates
Mumia's innocence has combined with growing demands in this country and
internationally to demand that he receive a new trial now.
There is only one plausible explanation for the incredible support won
by Mumia from trade unionists, human rights and faith-based organizations,
European governments, city governments from San Francisco to Detroit, and
civil liberties groups.
This broad support reflects the broad and growing awareness that police
frameups, coverups, murder, and brutality-assisted by city and state prosecutors
who work at the behest of the state power-as a matter of course, rather
than as an exception to the rule, lie, cheat, and steal to achieve their
racist ends.
The struggle for Mumia's freedom is coalescing a new national movement
which seeks to make the price of Mumia's murder too high to pay.
Socialist Action /April 1999 |