What the Trayvon Martin Case Tells Us and What YOU Can Do

Unfortunately cases like this happens all too often.... it just so happens that Trayvon's case hit the national spotlight. We all have stories of us or someone close to us in the same situation. Regardless of the outcome, it is 100% unacceptable.

In regards to the verdict that came down on Saturday, to be honest, I expected it, but it still saddens me greatly. However, we do know that that "George Zimmerman's business with the criminal court in Florida may be done, but a federal civil rights investigation remains open, and legal experts say he could face a civil suit"
Also there are online petitions and protests going on around the country.  So what are WE doing about it?  Get Busy!

Here are at least 9 things we can do...(off the top of my head)

Rallies in Raleigh, NC

1. We can sign petitions
2. Protest and rally in your community
3. Volunteer with your local 'get out the vote'
4. Write letters to your local, state and national reps to make changes
5. Better yet write our legislation and proposals ourselves
6. We can also make sure we're having "the talk" with our sons to make them safe (sad but necessary)
7. Teach our kids their heritage and history. 
8. Volunteer with organizations that support the uplift of our young men
9. VOTE IN EVERY ELECTION

These are just a few suggestions off the top of my head, but what else can we DO?

"The soul that is within me no man can degrade"

Frederick Douglass

Here's the thing, my heritage and my identity is not defined by my struggle(not solely), it is not defined by how someone else views me or is afraid of me or threatened by me. Our heritage is one of greatness, and leadership and genius and beauty and yes, resilience and strength.


Now, here are three petitions you can sign today:

The first is to tell all states to repeal or reject "Stand Your Ground" laws before more people are murdered for presenting imaginary threats.

http://www.thepetitionsite.com/takeaction/563/278/407/?z00m=20594296

The second is the NAACP petition to urge the Department of Justice to file civil rights charges against Zimmerman.

http://www.naacp.org/page/s/doj-civil-rights-petition

The third is a petition to free Marissa Alexander, a black woman serving 20 years for firing a warning shot and no one was killed.  Yes, Michael Vick went to jail for killing dogs while Zimmerman walks free for killing a teenage boy, but Marissa gets 20 years for killing no one.  Please sign this petition.

https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/pardon-marissa-alexander-serving-20-year-prison-sentence-firing-warming-shots/dbd2tBdS

Black America and President Obama.

"Some things he's done, it may not have been called 'black'. But it affected us." Rev. Al Sharpton

Whenever I see a headline referring to the idea that President Obama has not done enough for Black Americans, there are so many things that come to mind.  This article hits on some main points of both sides of the argument:  http://m.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2013/04/has-president-obama-done-enough-for-black-americans/274699/

Zuma Retains ANC Leadership

Jacob Zuma re-elected head of ANC

Jacob Zuma

South Africa's populist but often criticized president has been re-elected head of the ruling party, which makes him likely to win another term as the nation's leader in 2014. Delegates of the African National Congress voted overwhelmingly for five more years of Jacob Zuma.  Read more here:  http://www.voanews.com/content/south-africas-zuma-retains-anc-leadership/1567060.html

John Mahama declared winners of Ghana's Presidential Election

John Mahama, President of Ghana

Today's Ghana election results were announced.  John Mahama was declared the President of Ghana  Mahama took office in July after the unexpected death of President John Atta Mills.

John Dramani Mahama (/məˈhɑːmə/; born 29 November 1958) is a Ghanaian politician who has been President of Ghana since July 2012. He was the Vice President of Ghana from 2009 to 2012, and he took office as President on 24 July 2012 following the death of his predecessor, President John Atta Mills. He was re-elected in December 2012 following an election tainted by opposition claims of widespread fraud on the part of the Election Commission. A respected communications expert, historian, and writer, Mahama was a Member of Parliament from 1997 to 2009 and Minister of Communications from 1998 to 2001.

John Evans Fiifi Atta Mills

John Evans Fiifi Atta Mills (21 July 1944 – 24 July 2012) was a Ghanaian politician, a legal scholar and a tax expert who was President of Ghana from 2009 until his death in 2012. He was inaugurated on 7 January 2009, having defeated the ruling party candidate Nana Akufo-Addo in the 2008 election. He was vice-president from 1997 to 2001 under President Jerry Rawlings, and stood unsuccessfully in the 2000 and 2004 presidential elections as the candidate of the National Democratic Congress (NDC). He is the first Ghanaian Head of State to die in office.






http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-20661599
http://www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/NewsArchive/artikel.php?ID=258960

Official election results from ghanaweb.com:

African-American Voters...More Than a Fluke

“In 2008, for the first time in our history, African Americans voted at the same rate as white voters. We spent the next four years hearing that that high turnout was a fluke. “Experts” told us we would lose our enthusiasm. We’d be daunted by new voting laws. We’d want to protest marriage equality. We’d think our votes don’t count.

Those “experts” were wrong. African Americans turned out to vote in record numbers on Election Day, many of us waiting in long lines and going through plenty of red tape to do so.”

Read the entire article here: http://flaglerlive.com/47602/black-turnout/


Watch Dick Morris' explanation (about 1 min 45 sec in the video) on how demographics have changed...Oh and Jon Stewart's take on Morris is comical as well...

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It seems that many of the conservative responses to why the President won this election was not that people voted, but that now their vote matters because demographics have permanently changed?

What do you think?

I personally spoke with several young African-Americans who were eligible to vote for the first time and and voted and realized how their vote mattered.  The fact is, people gave their lives for the right to vote for all Americans and it would be foolish to waste it.  Now if we can extend this imperative to vote to the interim elections as well.

Congratulations President Barack Obama, 44th President of the United States of America

 
Today we congratulation President Barack Obama on winning a second presidential term.  Our prayers go up to God to provide wisdom, clarity, strength and protection for him and his family.

African Liberation Day

"Today we are one.  If in the past the Sahara divided us, now it unites us..." 

 Osageyfo Kwame Nkrumah

Conference of Independent African States, April 15, 1968

Ghana achieved independence from Britain on March 6, 1957 but Prime Minister (later President) Osagefyo Dr Kwame Nkrumah believed that; "Ghana's freedom would be meaningless if it was not linked with the total liberation of the entire continent of Africa," or as Sekou Toure later put it "the liberty of Africa is indivisible."  For Nkrumah,

Africa was not, "and can never be an extension of Europe."  

"Africa must unite," Nkrumah concluded and, therefore, within a year of his country's Independence, proceeded to organize a meeting of African independent states to consider African liberation.  The states included Egypt which attained independence in 1922, Ethiopia (date unknown), Liberia (1847), Libya (1951), Morocco (1956), Sudan (1956), Tunisia (1956), Ghana (1957), which Nkrumah referred to as the "only eight independent truly African states.

On April 15, 1958, in the city of Accra, Ghana, African leaders and political activists gathered at the first Conference of Independent African States. It was attended by representatives of the governments of Egypt (which attended as part of the United Arab Republic), Ethiopia, Ghana, Liberia, Libya, Morocco, Sudan, Tunisia, and representatives of the National Liberation Front of Algeria, and the Union of the Peoples of Cameroon. The conference was significant in that it represented the first pan-African Conference held on African soil.

"After 500 years of the most brutal suffering known to humanity, the rape of Africa and the subsequent slave trade, which cost Africa in excess of 100,000,000 of her children, the masses of African People singularly, separately, individually, in small disconnected groupings for centuries had said, “enough”! But in 1958, at the Accra Conference, it was being said in ways that emphasized joint, coordinated and unified action. "   http://www.thetalkingdrum.com/ald.html

 The Conference called for the founding of African Freedom Day, a day to “mark each year the onward progress of the liberation movement, and to symbolize the determination of the People of Africa to free themselves from foreign domination and exploitation.”

"African Liberation Day for us is only an instrument to help organize our people..." 

Kwame Ture

Five years later, after the First Conference of Independent African States in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa, another historic meeting occurred. On May 25, 1963, leaders of thirty-two independent African States met to form the Organization of African Unity (OAU). By then more than two thirds of the continent had achieved independence, mostly from imperial European states. At this meeting, the date of Africa Freedom Day was changed from April 15 to May 25, and Africa Freedom Day was declared African Liberation Day (ALD). 

About Nkrumah 
The Rt. Hon. Dr. Kwame Nkrumah was the leader of Ghana and its predecessor state, the Gold Coast, from 1952 to 1966. Overseeing the nation's independence from British colonial rule in 1957, Nkrumah was the first President of Ghana and the first Prime Minister of Ghana. An influential 20th-century advocate of Pan-Africanism, he was a founding member of the Organization of African Unity and was the winner of the Lenin Peace Prize in 1963.

About Ghana

The word Ghana means Warrior King and was the title accorded to the kings of the medieval West African Ghana Empire.   There is archaeological evidence showing that humans have lived in present-day Ghana since the Bronze Age.   By the early 11th century, the Akan were firmly established in a state called Bonoman. From the 13th century, numerous groups emerged from what is believed to have been the Bonoman area, to create several Akan States, mainly based on gold trading. These states included Denkyira, Akwamu, and Akyem. The Ga and Dagomba states were established by the 16th century.  By the 19th century, most of modern Ghanaian territory was included in the Empire of Ashanti, one of the most influential states in sub-Saharan Africa prior to colonial rule. The Ashanti government operated first as a loose network, and eventually as a centralized kingdom with an advanced, highly specialized bureaucracy centered in Kumasi.

Flag of Ghana

Trade with European states began after contact with the Portuguese in the 15th century, and the British established the Gold Coast Crown colony in 1874 over parts but not all of the country.     The Gold Coast achieved independence from the United Kingdom in 1957, becoming the first sub-Saharan African nation to do so from European Colonialism. The name Ghana was chosen for the new nation to reflect the ancient Empire of Ghana, which once extended throughout much of west Africa.  The Flag of Ghana, became the new flag in 1957. Designed by, Theodosia Salome Okoh, the red represents the blood that was shed towards independence, the gold represents the mineral wealth of Ghana, the green symbolizes the rich agriculture, and the black star is the symbol of African emancipation.


 

Read more here:  http://www.aaprp-intl.org/index.html
http://africanliberationday.net/
http://allafrica.com/stories/201005240652.html
http://www.thetalkingdrum.com/ald.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_Liberation_Day
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kwame_Nkrumah