People across the African diaspora recently commemorated Malcolm X’s 100th birth anniversary with a bevy of events, panel discussions and presentations that allowed for exploration of the freedom fighter’s life and what it means in the ongoing fight for Pan-African self-determination.
For D.C. resident and unabashed revolutionary Kwasi Seitu, May 19 marks the beginning of a new movement against the drugs, alcohol and illicit activity that’s taken over a federal park located at the intersection of Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr. avenues in Southeast.
“We want to reclaim this corner,” Seitu told The Informer as he spoke about Shepherd Parkway and the surrounding businesses. “We want the Popeyes gone. We want a bank there. We want the Koreans to say bye-bye and take the liquor store with you and your nasty little carry-out. These things represent the very things that Malcolm and Martin stood against for us.”
Throughout much of the day on May 19, Seitu and several other elders occupied Shepherd Parkway — a landmark they renamed Malcolm X – Dr. King Unity Park.
Breathologist Ayo Handy-Kendi kicked off the day-long gathering with a spiritual cleanse of the park. Other portions of the program included remarks by Senghor Baye of Universal Negro Improvement Association – African Communities League RC2020 and a musical number by Ka’Ba Soul Singer.
By the early afternoon, as revelers, from the community and other parts of the District, converged on the park to hear Proverbs Reggae Band, Seitu made his rounds along Martin Luther King, Jr. Avenue, speaking to passersby while standing near a banner donning Malcolm X’s image, that of King and three adinkra symbols representing God, unity, and Sankofa (meaning return and get it).
Those five images, Seitu said, represent the fulfillment of a vision where Black people are no longer exploited by forces benefitting from the destruction of majority-Black communities locally and nationwide.
“We got to do better than this,” Seitu said. “And I’m not mad at [other people], I’m mad at us for accepting this, going along with it and disrespecting our own space. We have a problem as a people. When it’s about us, we don’t care. When it’s not about us, we all up in it. Something [is] wrong with us.”
A Dear Friend and Comrade Honors Malcolm X on His 100th Birthday
Malcolm X, born on May 19, 1925 in Omaha, embarked on a journey similar to the legions of Black men and women who’ve come to admire and emulate him well after his death.
After his father’s death at the hands of the Ku Klux Klan, his mother’s bout with mental illness, and his subsequent entry into the foster care system, Malcolm X dropped out of school and succumbed to the allure of the streets.
During a seven-year prison stint, Malcolm X became a Muslim and joined the Nation of Islam (NOI), a Black separatist movement that heralded the Honorable Elijah Muhammad as a messenger of Allah. In his role as an NOI minister, Malcolm X oversaw the launch of nearly four dozen mosques across the U.S. He also compelled untold numbers of Black men and women to adopt healthy lifestyles and abstain from the vices crippling Black communities.
Though his embrace of Black Nationalism countered King’s message of integration, Malcolm X would become more collaborative with civil rights figures after his break from NOI, and his evolution as a Pan-Africanist. During the final months of his life, he travelled around the world and continued to work on behalf of Black people while under FBI, CIA and U.S. State Department surveillance.
At the time of his 1965 assasination, Malcolm X, then 39, was in the midst of efforts to bring the U.S. before the United Nations Commission on Human Rights for its alleged inability and unwillingness to protect Black people. Months prior, upon his return from Ghana, he announced the establishment of the Organization of Afro-American Unity (OAAU), an entity intended to organize people of African descent in the Western Hemisphere similarly to how newly independent African nations coalesced around what was then the Organization of African Unity.
On the night of Malcolm X’s centennial birthday, veteran journalist and founding OAAU member A. Peter Bailey reflected on the lessons he learned from the man he called his master teacher. He told a multigenerational audience at Howard University’s Blackburn Center that Malcolm X became a threat once he met one-on-one with seven African leaders, all of whom Bailey said backed Malcolm X’s plan to expose U.S. human rights abuses on the international stage.
“I visualize J. Edgar Hoover of the FBI, head of the State Department, and the president’s top people, how they would respond to that,” Bailey said on that Monday evening. “He met with these leaders — I don’t mean a conference. He met with each one for 1.5 to 3 hours — President Nzikwe of Nigeria, President Kenyatta of Kenya, President Nasser of Egypt, President Nkrumah of Ghana, President Nyere of Tanzania, [Prime Minister] Obote of Uganda, and President Toure of Guinea.”
Near the end of his presentation, Bailey gave a call to action, much like what he’s done in recent years during panel discussions and other public events.
“I hope brothers and sisters…can really at least try to pull through and do something with… Black unity and Pan-Africanism,” Bailey said. “One of the things we come out here to do is set up concrete things in the areas of education, economics, culture, communication, psychology. Bro. Malcolm said specifically what we need to do in those areas to take care of ourselves.”
Bailey, one of the OAAU’s last living founding members and current member of the collective known as Positive Black Folks in Action, gave his remarks after an African drum call by his son Joe Bailey and a pouring of libations by Nana Kwabena Brown, chief priest of the Temple of Nyame. The rest of the evening included remarks from Dr. Greg Carr, chair of the HU Department of Afro-American Studies, and poetry from the likes of: Josh Myers, an HU associate professor of Africana Studies; Laini Mataka, Esther Iverem, and Kenneth Carroll.
Other parts of the program included a reading of Malcolm X quotes related to education, politics, economics, communications and media, and Dr. Sharon Conn’s presentation about ongoing developments at the Malcolm X Liberation Institute in Ghana. Brandon Green later spoke on behalf of APPEAL, a D.C.-based nonprofit and cooperative about projects that he said fulfill Bailey’s insistence on Black economic sufficiency.
Long before the program ended with a singing of Stevie Wonder’s “Happy Birthday” song, the Mass Emphasis Children’s History & Theatre Company, under the direction of journalist-educator-organizer Obi Egbuna Jr., wowed the audience with a recitation of poetry in English and Spanish.
In his subsequent remarks, Egbuna too outlined action steps to avenge what he described as Malcolm X’s U.S. government-orchestrated assasination, especially at a time when the Shabazz children are seeking millions of dollars in damages from the New York Police Department, CIA and FBI.
“That doesn’t belong in civil court, it belongs in criminal court,” Egbuna said. “The FBI and CIA are the world’s greatest criminals and we need to make an appeal to [the Shabazz children and Attorney Ben Crump], and that requires ramifications, because if they take the money and run, it sends a message that that was an isolated incident and a bad judgment.”
Egbuna then, while looking at the group of preteens and teenagers on the stage, implored audience members to humanize Malcolm X and make him more accessible to those taking up the mantle of Pan-African liberation.
“Too many times we honor our leaders and we make them sacred,” Egbuna said. “We make them God. The message we give these children, not only can they continue Brother Malcolm’s work, they can take it to new, unprecedented heights. We must not be intimidated by him.”
A Spoken Word Artist Finds His Way — With Malcolm X’s Help
Other events that took place in observance of the Malcolm X centennial included: a national reparations rally at Lansburgh Park in Southwest; a “political, historical, and cultural” tribute to Malcolm X hosted by Ben Chavis, president of the National Newspaper Publishers Association, at the Thurgood Marshall Center for Culture and Heritage in Northwest; and a Malcolm X 100th birthday bus pilgrimage from Baltimore to Malcolm X’s burial site, Schomburg Center and other landmarks of relevance in New York City.
On the eve of the celebrated activist’s centennial, members of Malcolm X Grassroots Movement, Pan-African Community Action, Black Alliance for Peace, and other organizations converged on the corner of Malcolm X Avenue and Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue in Southeast as a stand against neocolonialism, imperialism, and Zionism.
On that Sunday afternoon, Southeast resident and artist Ahmed Malik took to the mic and performed his songs “Libations” and “Waaah,” each of which, respectively, touched on intra-community violence and how systemic oppression exacerbates substance use. A day after, while speaking to The Informer, he called his actions on the corner of Malcolm X and Martin Luther King, Jr. Avenues part of an offensive against the centuries-long war raged against Black people in the U.S.
“Brother Malcolm or Malik El Hajj Shabazz or Omowalé, didn’t just inspire this music but he inspires my spirit to keep fighting to get our people’s house in order so that we can escape the burning building Dr. King spoke about in his final speeches,” said Malik, who also goes by AhkTilJah. “The ballot hasn’t worked for us, it’s led to the bullets. It’s up to us to create the very systems we need to execute the reality we don’t just want, but need to create in order to sustain, thrive and maintain longevity away from Babylon.”
The artist concluded, evoking a saying popularized by the man who fueled his passion for liberation.
“And most importantly,” he said, “we have to do it ‘by any means necessary.’”
