Open Letter to Obama July 15, 2012 By Hakima Abbas

When you were making your great strides in the machinery that is the U.S.A, I watched from your father’s land in Kenya. I watched initially with great fear as those around me cheered in jubilation. I thought myself a coward for being so scared. I feared that, like many before you, you would become a conveniently vilified symbol of what your image does not represent. I feared for the dignity of millions of our African sisters and brothers in the U.S.A for whom promised democracy, redress and reparation have still to be realized. And I feared for your life. We heard, below your King overtones, your Malcolm words and subtle gestures, so that even veteran Black nationalists were singing your praises. And I feared their unwavering optimism, while realizing in your unmatched mobilization how ineffective we had been.

It was a hard truth to swallow. But those times taught me so much about who I am, where I am and what I am holding onto. I learnt that an anchor should hold you but cannot lead you. I learnt that Malcolm’s relevance is not in our outdated Black Power salute, nor our rhetoric, not even in our unapologetic counter to a five hundred year old system of oppression, but that his relevance is in our ability to make his words our own, today, in this time, in our own deeds….

Which is why there are generations like ours, a generation whose manifest destiny is seemingly and simply to remember: to carry from our grandmothers to our daughters the resistance cry of generations. Now, brother Barack, the winds of change are slowly raising the dust. And we have seen people on a move, attempting to rock the foundation of injustice. You have been a character in this determining act in the theatre of humankind. And as the curtain is drawn on African awakening spreading from Guinea, Madagascar and Mozambique to Africa’s North, the world has begun to pay attention. Now is when we will all decide which way history will fall and whether the lion or the hunter will live to tell the tale. I know where you have stood, I know where I will stand.

Peace,

Hakima

Read the whole letter here

Malcolm X In Focus: A Happy Birthday Roundtable Discussion

Another angle of discussion on the legacy Malcolm X from Voxunion…

To commemorate the birthday of Malcolm X we convened a very special 2 hour program, a round table discussion featuring in the first hour Glen Ford Executive Editor of Black Agenda Report.com, Dr. Mark Bolden of the Association of Black Psychologists and Kali Akuno of the Malcolm X Grassroots Movement and US Human Rights Network.  In hour 2 we had Kalonji Olusegun current vice-president of the Republic of New Afrika, former vice-presidential nominee of the Green Party Rosa Clemente and Dr. Todd Burroughs of Morgan State University.  Ours was a round table discussion critical of recent scholarship on Malcolm X and in praise of the man himself and the ideas he represented.  We attempted to re-focus Malcolm in the midst of all surrounding confusion.

Malcolm X In Focus: A Happy Birthday Roundtable Discussion.

Manning Marable’s Controversial New Biography Refuels Debate on Life and Legacy of Malcolm X

After two decades of work, Dr. Manning Marable completed a new biography, “Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention.” Dr. Marable used material for his book that recently made available, thus providing a new insight into the famed civil rights leader. His biography, however, has also refueled the debate on many controversial aspects of Malcolm X’s life and interpretation of his politics and legacy. To discuss the Dr. Marable’s biography, we host a roundtable discussion with three guests. Amiri Baraka is an acclaimed poet, playwright, music historian and activist based in Newark, New Jersey. Herb Boyd is Harlem-based activist, teacher and author who edits the online publication, The Black World Today and writes for several publications, including Amsterdam News. Michael Eric Dyson is a professor of sociology at Georgetown University and is the author of numerous books including, “Making Malcolm: The Myth and Meaning of Malcolm X.”

watch video via DemocracyNow.