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Woman’s voice: Testing two, test, test, test.
Jones: (under woman’s voice) – (unintelligible). Months when we were being bombarded. They had rocket launchers out there, ready to destroy us.
(section ends)
(Speaks slowly) Attention, attention. Where it appeared that the office had healed itself, there is some question now that pressures and ungrateful people have brought back their pressures on the office. So we need an emergency transportation to Matthew’s Ridge so an airplane can carry certain (Unintelligible word, sounds like “cells”) from the office. If you will comply, please do this- do so as quickly as possible. Don’t worry, the office has healed everything, and he will continue to heal, but there has been an unusual amount of demanding people and insensitive people in these last few weeks. Thank you so much. (Tape edit)
-tion, attention, attention. Steve Biko, killed by the CIA through the Union of South Africa, upheld by the dread multinational ruling elite of US imperialism. His death was celebrated throughout Guyana. It is a year since Biko, a black South A- African militant met his violent death in a grim Pretoria – that’s the capital of the Union of South Africa – prison. The black prisoner was in the struggle against the racist apartheid white South African government. Christian government. Christian nationalist party and the party of South Africa. Guyana, forever in solidarity with oppressed people the world over, held rallies all over the nation in honor of the slain leader this week at Leeds Government School on the Corentyne, Demerara [Rivers], and many hundreds marched down the streets of Georgetown.
Born in a land where slavery still exists, Steve Biko, B-i-k-o, was detained on August 18, 1977, for violating an order restricting him to his hometown, King William Town, and for being involved in subversive activities in prison. He was chained hand and foot, and subjected to various forms of horrible, gross, inhuman torture. The high water mark of cruelty was meted out, said the Guyana newspaper, the New Nation, was meted to him on the- September 11, when he was driven na- naked, handcuffed and mortally sick for six hundred miles from Port Elizabeth to Pretoria, said the PNC, the People’s National Congress, which is our party. That’s the avant-garde party, remember. Forbes Burnham is our Prime Minister. The opposition is People’s Progressive Party. PPP. Doctor [Cheddi] Jagan is its head and his wife is [Janet] Jagan. We oppose it because it supports apanjhat, which means vote your own kind. Anyway, he was droven- he was driven these six hundred miles, mortally wounded. He died the next day. His death brought on an international outcry and pressure against [South African Prime Minister Johannes] Voster – V-o-s-t-e-r – the fascist ally of Adolf Hitler. Vorster was an open adol- a- ally of Adolf Hitler during World War II. A brilliant and original thinker. He will be remembered for his philosophy of black consciousness, which he once described as group pride, and the determination by blacks to rise and attain their envisaged self through socialism. He had a practical plan, but he was peaceful, and he was a guiding light to his people who saw him- in him the sterling qualities of a leader. He founded the South African Students Organization and was the honorary president of the Black People’s Convention- con- con- convention organizations that have constantly agitated the moral and social upliftment for the ha- blacks who live in absolute terror. They live in abject slavery still, and they’re upheld by our tax dollars. I read to you just two weeks ago of several billion dollars that’d been sneaked in by [Gerald] Ford and [Nelson] Rockefeller and some of the big corporations to keep that nation in power that’s outnumbered seventeen to one. Seventeen blacks to one. Not mentioning the Indians and the Asians who are also second cla- class citizens. But still, they maintain their rule. Also, we have guilt. We ought to work. I don’t know why some of you don’t take guilt. You bought sandwiches, you went to movies, you wasted money, and every time you bought a piece of candy you paid taxes that went into the fund, the tax fund that helped to torture this brave-looking young man. Shows a picture of him and his courageous eyes, changed [chained] as he is, every part of his body, but he looks bravely outward and onward. We should feel ashamed that we do not do more. (Pause) Anyway, he was a president of the Black People’s Convention organization that have constantly agitated for moral and so- social upliftment for the blacks. Though he is dead, fascist Vorster, dictator of Union of South Africa, and his henchmen are constantly worried about the growing influence that he has left behind. Undoubtedly black consciousness is on the upsurge.
Continuing the results of the inquest into Biko’s death, most of this world has already anticipated the verdict. Inevitably, Pretoria, the capital of the fascist state of Union of South Africa on the tip of the continent, the largest and richest continent on earth, Pretoria’s Chief Magistrate Marthinius Prins [phonetic] cleared the security police of all blame, just as they’re always been the case in the United States. No policeman is ever found guilty, even though in the average big city in USA, a couple of blacks are killed every night, but the police are always found innocent. He found the security police free of blame, through [though] medical evidence proved that Biko had sustained extensive brain damage, even though this evidence was clearly established by seven separate doctors, among other things. Just extensive brain damage. You don’t get brain damage from just f- falling down. Major brain damage, major- seven blows to the head. In bringing him in to the inquest, the Chief Magistrate declared available evidence does not prove the death was brought about by any act of omission by any person.
Steve Biko is survived by a wife and two small children, his mother, a sister and brother, and the all-pervading and prevailing force of black consciousness and socialist consciousness that is growing by leaps and bounds throughout the continent of Africa, a force, that Vorster, the fascist ally of Hitler, will always have to fear and reckon with, which will inevitably bring the downfall of the white racist South African regime.
Let us think about how fortunate we are to be here as a family. That’s why we should produce. So we could produce more, not just be content to make ball- uh, dolls to sus- sustain ourself but make dolls so we could help Guyana. They sent- Guyana’s not a rich nation, but they had their flags at half-mast and they sent one hundred thousand dollars se- secretly into the Union of South Africa to help the fight of the brave black people there for their liberation. We should be in a position to assist, but some of you are so lazy and have no black pride at all. You have no Indian pride, because Indians and blacks and Chinese, Asiatics are treated just the same by that dread regime in South Africa. I hope you’ll hear this and have it repeated several times this afternoon, so that maybe some people will waken to this. Be sure that it is heard at a noon hour. To think that some of you can- do not work when you could be inventive as some have that I mentioned yesterday, ways of making money. And you set on your duff and do nothing. You are as bad as the killers of Steve Biko. You might as well been one of those that held the pipes, the metal pipes that seven policemen beat his head until it was broken open with seven metal pipes. You might as well have been one of them, because you do nothing to try to make conditions better.
President Carter said that the Camp David talks (long pause) were his most difficult thing that he ever did. [He] Said it is very frustrating. Both Egypt and Israel wanted to give up- (Pause) wanted to uh, bo- both Egypt and uh- (Pause) Just a moment, stand by. Someone’s asking me a question. I can’t do two things at a time. (Pause)
Back with the news. (Speaks slowly) President Carter said that Camp David talks were the most difficult thing he ever did. Said it was very frustrating. Both Egypt and Israel wanted to give up. [Anwar] Sadat, dictator of Egypt, sellout to the Arab League, said he was ready to call a helicopter and threatened to do so to get away. And [Menachim] Begin, dictator of Israel, actually tried to crawl under the barbed wire fence to get away. They said it was Carter’s perseverance that kept it together. The final breakthrough was last weekend. They said if the agreement did not work out, there would be total war – that means no- nuclear war – and many are pessimistic about the outcome of the supposed agreement at Camp David in United States with President Carter. Begin said the agreement at Camp David will offer Israel honor and security, if it is kept according to its promises, but of course every nation interprets the words of the security agreement as they please.
Secretary of State, Cyprus [Cyrus] Vance, will arrive this morning in Jordan to tell them of the agreements and rally Arab support in Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Syria. Jordan and Saudi Arabia are not enthusiastic at all about the agreement, and Syria has condemned vitriolically, violently. The agreement saying that the agreement is a sell-out of Arab interest to Ju- Jewish powerful Zionist- Jewish influences in the United States and the capitalist world and human rights. Vance is trying to get King Hussein to support.
Carter is on his way to Atlantic City to speak to the United Steelworkers. Ray Marshall, the secretary of the United Steelworkers [U.S. Secretary of Labor] said there will be no wage and price controls as of yet.
The Soviets (Pause) voiced their disapproval of the Camp David talks between Sadat and Begin, as they rightfully should, while three nations are talking about other people’s nations that’ve been conquered by the fascist aggressors, Israel. They found that objectionable, and they voiced their disappointment at the Camp David talks. They said it left a hazy diplomatic image. There was no progress, and Sadat ha- (Pause) lost more than he gained, said the Soviet Union, and so does most of the other nine- non-aligned nations of the world. It was certainly not considered a- a breakthrough by the non-aligned world.
South African Prime Minister Vorster is said to be resigning today, and the relations with the United States will be broken due to the southwest situation in Namibia. As much as USA through the United Nations has compromised the freedom of Namibia, it is not enough for the fascist regime, that multinational corporations and USA have seen now that Union of South Africa have neutron bombs, as our Air Force jokingly calls nigger bombs, meaning bombs to ki- kill blacks and Indians and Asians in their ghettos. Those bombs are also located supposedly in American control in Rhodesia as well. (Pause) So, the situation is bad. Relations will be broken today with the southwest- uh- in the southwest situation [in] Namibia.
Conservative Senators in a group are tr- trying to kill the bill developed by Republicans and Democrats that would give a tax break for families with less than ten thousand dollars a year. Of course American Senators would wa- not want anybody who marry- makes a marry- magor- meager salary of ten thousand, and you can’t live on ten thousand a year in United States, no matter how you try. But they are trying to block this tax plan. Senator [Robert] Byrd, Whip, charge Senator for the Democrats in the Congress of the Senate, heads the opposition and said this would be a new welfare plan. As a rightwing turn that is sickening oppen- ominous, and I don’t understand how anybody who listens- and some of you people are going to listen because you don’t pass any test, and we’re going to see that through Professor [Edith] Roller and some other teachers that five nights a week, you will be listening, because it’s only right that you listen to understand what’s happening, so that you would have enough pride that you would not want to be in a nation that is destroying black people, Indian people, and Asian people.
The California Public Utilities has put a restriction of sales of devices for telephones that taped advertisements are on.
UPI says that the Russians have just passed (Pause) their space endurance test of ninety-six days. A record breaking test for the world. They’ve been up in the air, orbiting in the earth for ninety-six days.
Senator Edward Byrd- Br- Brooke [R-Mass], in spite of divorce scandal, won re-nomination for a third term by fifty-seven to forty-seven percent, as it seems the United States people at least are beginning to rebel against the monopoly press, which is the arm of US capitalist monopoly elitist which comes in to crush a person, tear them down and then, after they have tarnished their image, move in with tax investigators and other things to try to destroy them. Well, that’s interesting news. Some bad news. The bad news I just gave you that the welfare plan and the tax break for the poor working class was going to be stopped. (Pause)
Anyway, Oklahoma City: David Boone [Boren] won against [Ed] Edmondson for Senator. That is a right wing victory.
Biloxi, Mississippi: Policemen and firemen are on strike. There is a ten PM to five PM c- uh- curfew. Chicago state police called in to control the area. Firemen want to collect- want collective bargaining and eight and a half percent pay increase, shorter on duty hours. They threaten a strike at the first of the year. This is in Chicago and Biloxi, Mississippi. This is an encouraging sign when the law enforcement, which are always willing to do the dirty work of the oppressor, are beginning to realize that they’re being used. But it’s too late, because the buttons of the nuclear bombs are in control of the madmen of capitalism.
Kent State: Teachers strike. Keeping ten thousand out of school. Good.
General Services Administration has a high percentage of crooks and fraud. It is presently being (Pause) investigated.
Natural gas bill survived, and move to send it to (unintelligible word) back to committee by 59 to 39 vote in support- (Pause, moves microphone) in support of the bill. The bill would have been killed for the entire year if it had been sent back to committee. [U.S. Secretary of Energy James] Schlesinger said the gas bill would help trade and alleviate pressure on the dollar. The opposition to the bill said in two years, there will be less gas and less exploration for it. Efforts are still being made to torpedo the bill and have a bill giving the president emergency power over gasoline. Uh- This is another rightwing and dangerous move to the people. It is a bill that will give the gas- oil companies unregulated prices. They can charge whatever they want. They could charge five dollars a gallon for gasoline, and this would be chaos in the United States, and the opposition lost. It still looks like it’s on its way to victory.
NBC: Fifty Republicans are on the plane to New York and across country to promote and sell a huge nationwide tax cut. A rightwing swing in US politics is about to eliminate all welfare services. You hear the hue and cry in every state to cut back medical services, even general hospitals. They feel if people don’t have jobs, it’s their own fault, when there are not enough jobs available for poor people and not enough for mothers who cannot work because they have to take care of their children. But they want a nationwide Proposition 13, and it’s gaining momentum by the hour. Fascism is growing fast in USA.
US primaries will be held October 7, this year.
California scientists at Cal-Tech said they have discovered a heavy space traffic area of asteroids in a place that they thought was an empty space.
Managua, Nicaragua: There was a serious power failure this morning. The lights are said to be on now. Opposition to the [President Anastasio] Somoza regime, upheld by our tax dollars that should cause uh, pain every time we hear it, we caused his support, he’s been in power 44 years by the US tax dollars. Anyway, opposition to the Somoza regime, it was said, may be- may be uh- may stage an attack during the power failure.
Massachusetts Democratic voters voted conservative. Not surprised, everything’s going conservative. Conservative, to you that don’t understand, is bad for working class people. Conservative Ed King into office. He is against tax increases. Mike- (Pause) See? No help for the poor. (Singsong tone) You always believe, some of you still believe you can go to Kansas City and see Suzie. You have no pride and (Stern tone) you’re going to get it though, ’cause you’re going to be setting right in a class and you’re going to be learning it. Teachers, I demand heavy grading.
Dukakis, Mike Dukakis, the former Senator [governor] had promoted their schemes of helping the poor. There would be no new taxes but was unable to keep the promise.
The House of Representatives passed a bill to increase the amount of dollars of duty free goods coming into the United States. Presently, persons may bring in one hundred dollars worth of goods without paying duty. Now people may bring three hundred dollars worth of goods into the country without paying duty. Another strike for the rich.
Wichita, Kansas. Some striking police were jailed due to ignoring one part of the strike clause. Police across the nation seemed to have more sense than blacks, Indians and Asians. They’re striking everywhere. They were thrown in jail. If they do much of this, I’ll tell you, there’ll be a lot of uproar. You’ll soon see the army in the streets and the concentration camps set up, and they’ll just as soon put the police in the concentration camps as they will black, Asians and Indians. Anyway, they were put in jail for ignoring one part of the strike clause.
Nebraska had a light snow, showing the first part of winter in the United States.
Portland, Oregon. As an in- initiation to a club, a fifteen-year-old boy had to roller skate into a shopping center wearing a dress, then go nude into a doughnut shop. A policeman was in the shop and arrested him. Rhode Island. That’s the kind of diversions, the Roman circuses, just before the fall of Rome. That was the kind of idiocy, eating big sandwiches that’re a mile long. That’s the kind of idiocy that goes along with the decline and fall of a great civilization.
Rhode Island. A large- a city where- here voted to rename their different sexist language titles from utilityman to utilityperson. Oh, that’s a great progressive breakthrough. They were also renaming manholes to person holes, but were the laughingstock of the state, so they voted against it. Yes, because men still have such a chauvinistic hold in USA. Women must rise up and take their liberation.
Ford Motor Company will have a four point two percent price increase on 1979 cars. The average person, with the cost of living as it is and the increase of taxation, will not be able to afford a new car. General Motors 1979 cars will barely pass the fuel standards. They get nineteen point two miles per gallon.
New York City: Latinos are using a language called Spanglish, a mixture of English and Spanish. They are not able to speak English so they mix (Pause) (short laugh) the language. Uh, Doctor Keller says it is easier for them to speak this. A Texas professor says Span- Spanglish should be- American-Spanish should be taught all over the nation of the country, because it is suspected that the Puerto Ricans and Latinos are learning the language so that they can be plotting revolution against the system. Yes, well, let them try to learn American Spanglish if they can. Says should be taught all over the co- the country.
(Struggles with news item) Other bilingualists in Finland or Ireland scientists are experiments- experimenters with rat poison. The poison they are giving, one not named, Clyde, (Stumbles over words) one rat named Clyde rather, they’re- they’re experimenting for some reason with rat poisoning, and one they’re giving a (Pause) rat named Clyde. (Pause) (More relaxed tone) That’s very nice, let’s see what they’ve got in mind. The poison they are giving one rat, as I said, named Clyde, is Clyde’s favorite food. Apparently poison is very tasty. The report said that it had other ramifications. It’s a part of the technology of war science. I guess they’ll give us food that will be tasty now, so we can kill ourselves and they won’t have to put us in gas chambers.
Alcohol studies. University of California at Irving [Irvine]. Ninety-five million Americans drank excessively. Drank and s- more drink in m- moderation. Studies are being done on the effects of alcohol to the brain. They show that the alcohol literally eats brain cells away and affects learning, memory, perceptions, and processes of thinking permanently. Rat experiments showed that rats put on a high alcohol diet had a fifty percent decrease of the substance necessary for cell reproduction. The alcohol destroyed the genetic material needed to reproduce the- the brain cells. Alcohol in excess can also cause many other physical problems, such a- such as pancreatic disease, a fatal disease, heart disease, high blood pressure, liver disease, and deterred mental cap- capability, not to mention a host of other disease. Alcohol does not help fighting virus, and al- it also diminishes the sex drive. Don’t you see the genocide in that? What is more available in the black community and the Indian community than alcohol? They don’t want any more blacks, they don’t want any more Indians, so they give them plenty of alcohol, so they won’t have any sex, and they don’t want them to be able to think to resist, so alcohol destroys fifty percent of their brain cells. Gives them pancrea- pancreatic disorders and other disorders. All kinds of disorders. Early death from hypertension and heart disease. Very clever way. You don’t have to have gas ovens in USA. Very clever way to destroy US citizens. But of course, some of you refuse to think, and I’m getting tired of it. I’m getting tired of the same dumb faces out there that refuse. Some brilliant people are here who have really got it down – kids who didn’t have any education, seniors who didn’t have any education – but there are some of you, you just look stupid when you- when anyone looks at you. You don’t even try to learn anything. Well, you’re going to learn, ’cause we’re going to have five extra classes a night for those that fail this test.
A recent study on placebos. And that means water. The doctor often gives water instead of giving medications. They save medicine- money that way. Said that they work just as well as regular pain medication. One-third of the experimental patients gained relief. Oh, I’m sure the capitalists are glad to hear that, so that uh, now they can save money and charge the patient that much more for water. That’s what a placebo means. One of the reasons may have been physio- psycho- physiological. (Pause) Endorphens, E-n-d-o-r-p-h-e-n-s – the doctor should take note of this – which are the body’s natural painkillers, are released from the brain, causing relief of pain in some patients. It was said that perhaps the taking of the placebo stimulated endor- endorphen production. Well, something to consider, but I certainly am not giving our patients placebos if they’re in pain.
We shall go on with the news and see if there’s anything else of any interest. (tape edit)
Attention. The brave Guyanese government, struggling to maintain its own socialist cooperative democracy, has been praised by the Sahara socialist. Praise- they praise Guyana, support financially and in other ways for freedom for their struggle. The people of the new socialist-oriented Arab Democratic Sahrawian Republic on the North African coast, struggling to preserve their independence against US foreign aggression, have at the time- at all times received the active support of the government of the cooperative republic of Guyana at international forums. The fact was last week acknowledged by two Polisario representatives who were visiting Guyana for discussions with officials of the party and government. The visitors were Belau Armand, Polisario’s Habana-based Caribenan- Caribbean representative and (unintelligible name), Polisario- Politbert- Politburo member of the Soviet Union. Their discussions were mainly with comrade Robert Corbin, First Vice Chairman of the party and Minister of State in the Ministry of the National Development, as well as comrade Rashleigh Jackson, Minister of Foreign Affairs. It was his wife that placed little Neal [Welcome] with Joyce and Charlie [Touchette] to be their child.
Polisario is a popular Marxist front for the liberation of the Saguia El Hamra and Rio De Oro, the two provinces known- the two provinces of the republic, popularly known as Western Sahara in one of the most oppressive areas in the world. The Saharan people fighting bl- bloody guerilla battles for many years against French-backed Moroccan and Mauritanian imperialist collaborators are now in control of nine-tenths of their territory. They have formed a government with Islam as the state religion and socialism the ultimate goal. At the center of the Sahara, S-a-h-a-r-a, dispute are important Spanish-owned deposits of phosphate at Bucraa, B-u-c-r-a-a, in Saguia El Hami- Hamra, H-a-m-r-a. By the way, that area that I’m talking about, that’s how big our great home- roots of our being is. That little edge, up there, the northwest edge of Africa would fit in all of the United States, plus Alaska. Border countries, Morocco and Mauritania have been maintaining claims to parts of the territory formerly under Spanish colonial rule. But another neighbor, Algeria, favors the creation of an independent state and to this end has been the leading sponsor of Polisario, and Guyana has formed strong al- alliances with Algeria which since 1975 was acknowledged by the United Nations as the most effective and widely supported of the Sahara liberation movements. (microphone moves) Had to stop for a question. It was the most widely– most effective and widely supported of the Sahara liberation movements. Their ineffective rivals have been the Moroccan fascist-backed liberation and unity-backed liberation, front – FLU – and the Sahrawi, S-a-h-r-a-w-i, National Union Party. All rightwing, national union parties, backed by USA dollars smuggled in by multinational capitalist monopolies from USA. National Union Party (unintelligible name), an elitist movement sponsored by Spain and USA by indirect support in an attempt to protest its ina- its interest. Most people are- most people in the Caribbean and in Guyana are not really aware of the struggle being waged for freedom and independence in the former colony of Spanish Sahara.
How, where, why did it begin? Our visitors explained the struggle of the great, brave Saharan people organized in the Polisario – P-o-l-i-s-a-r-i-o – Front started on- in 1973. The inaugural con- congress of the Polisario Front took place on May 10, 1973, and on May 20, the first armed operation was launched. The Polisario Front should not be seen as a spontaneous and creation- a creation but rather as a part of a tradition of struggle. It is the continuation of the struggle of people through generation after generation. Our people have been waging continuous struggle against foreign intervention and even their maneuvers to outright starve us to death, a struggle that started way back in the sixteenth century. The Polisario Front – a Marxist front – carried out that struggle at all levels against the illegal presence of the Spanish fascist regime that was upheld by Adolf Hitler and now by USA’s NATO. Upheld by colonialism, in other words, in our territory. The Polisario Front is now recognized as the only legitimate representative of the Saharan people. The country, slightly larger than Guyana, lies four thousand miles- you know Guyana’s 83,000 square miles. This is from the Guyana Chronicle that I am giving you this commentary, so it shows a certain real black liberation consciousness. The country is slightly larger than Guyana, lies four thousand miles across the Atlantic on the African coast between Morocco and Mauritania, where for a moment we thought there might be a Mauritanian leftward takeover, but it was apparently subdued.
Before the first European penetrations in the part of the continent in the sixteenth century, the people of Sahara organized themselves in the Assembly of the Forty. This assembly was the result of a democratic setting together of the different tribes. It was the administrative power established to resolve the internal problems created as a result of foreign aggression. Our people, said comrade Ahmed, A-h-m-e-d, also confronted and rejected an attempts- any attempts by the USA, British and Portuguese colonials to establish a foothole- foothold in the territory. The Spanish colonialists, backed by US imperialism, were attracted to their- to our territory by the coastlands, the waters of which were rich in fishery resources. In 1884, a meeting in Berlin of the colonial forces of the period – white colonial forces – passed our or- territory into the hands, without even consulting us, to the Spaniards. From that time onward, there were fifty years of continuous struggle against the Spaniards, and our people were nearly wiped out- three quarters of our people. In 1934, although the struggle of our people did not wane, it took on a different expression, and in 1957 the national liberation army was formed and the struggle grew in intensity. On May 12, 1975, one of the commi- commissions of the United Nations visited the territory, and in the report of the commission, it was stated that the Polisario Front was the only dominant political force in the territory. It became very clear at the international level that the Polisario Front was the only legitimate representative of the people of the Sahara, whether the US imperialist and her lackeys liked it or not. The troops of aggression are saying that the Saharan people have never existed and are divided, incapable and unorganized. That’s what they always said about we who are black and Indian and Asian, unable to manage our affairs. For such a small people to have confronted foreign aggression with massive wea- weapons of advanced technology, and to do it victoriously, proves that on the contrary, our people, our black and brown people of Africa, are not divided, but united, organized and capable. In the struggle, we have achieved many victories. One of the most important has been the (Pause) constitutional changes proclaiming the Arab Democratic socialist Sahrawian Republic which in- which is recognized by m- all the nonaligned countries. The struggle of the Sahrawian people, the same as the struggle of all other of the uh, peoples of the world who are oppressed by US imperialism and her lackeys, should receive the solidarity of the international community. The people of the Sahara have at all times counted on the solidarity of the people of the Caribbean. The Saharan people have at all times received- people have at all times received active support of the Guyana government. Even when we were hard pressed financially, we managed to send funds from Guyana yearly to help the Polisario Front fight the fascist oppressors. At international forums also, we would always speak up on their behalf. International forums of course are not enough. Aid is needed. And even appeal is made by the Guyanese for those who are willing to go and fight in the Sahara to see that the Saharans get their freedom from the dictatorships of Morocco.
We expect a show of solidarity from all our friends. War generates solidarity. In this respect, the people of the Sahara will intensify the struggle and in this way fulfill our command- co- our commitment to the international progressive community. Everyone has discarded the USA idea that we can find a peaceful solution to the oppressor’s hold on Africa and all oppressed nations.
Thus ends the news and commentary. Thank you very much and I love you dearly. Please spend time dressing up the houses, doing extra things, planting things, taking special regard, ’cause I gave you some things today that should make us feel a lot of guilt that we have this place, and there’re so many more, I think it was a hundred and sixty three prisoners that wanted to get out, white and black. One of them I know is back (Unintelligible word) Bishop Moore [United Methodist minister John Moore] sent to us, who’d been here, had been packed in with seventeen other prisoners. By the way, the radio station should try to get his statement into the newspaper. Maybe if we have to put in an advertisement, we should get his statement in the newspaper. We should get all those statements into the newspaper. But let’s try first to get them in. We’ve got wonderful news coverage of Doctor (Pause) Lang- (Pause) Mark Lane.
We’ve got wonderful coverage. It’s been on all the stations, all night and all day. And it’s caused Doctor Jagan to ask for an invi- interview and uh, a show of support, so we hope that some unity can come out of it. And we of course are granting that. But we have not unfortunately been organized well enough. The first thing we should do when people are coming of renown is to set up interviews. If the people did not seem to be suitable for interviews, we could always cancel, but here was Doctor Freed [Don Freed, author and screenwriter], one of the best linguists in the world, one of the most popular authors in USA, and then not a word in the newspaper about him. So we must push hard to get that. I’m speaking to uh, the radio, Mike Prokes and others like this, to think of schemes and then the bishop uh, the Methodist church and Doctor [Carlton] Goodlett and his fine statements and his powerful offices that he holds, the most powerful black man in America. Even if we have to put out an ad, I think that should be done. I think it’s worthy of it being done. Thank you very much. (moves microphone)
In the usual style of capitalist press, its incredible fascism, (Unintelligible word) shatter the testimony of [James] Earl Ray. Open hearings on the murder of Doctor Martin Luther King before the House of Assassinations Committee were adjourned, August 18, with longstanding questions about possible FBI questions uh, uh- about possible FBI involvements and conspiracy unexamined. So said that, New York Times. They admitted that there were many questions unresolved. But I want you to know how they attempt to tear down a man’s testimony and that the court system of the United States offers you no hope whatsoever. And I keep remembering some sister here who’s always saying “well, I’ll be cleared in court, I’ll be cleared in court.” Courts never clear black people or poor people.
(off microphone) There’s a fly over there.
But the five-day hearing did shatter the credibility of James Earl Ray’s claims, said the New York Times, that he was the victim of a frame-up. Ray’s alibi was a sharply-disputed and his much-awaited chance to give his full story was instead a prolonged anticlimax. Ray, who confessed to the murder and later repudiated his confession, maintained during his three days as a witness that he did not kill the black civil rights leader ten mi- ten years ago in Memphis. Ray is serving a 99-year sentence for the murder. He insisted throughout that a mysterious smuggler of guns and narcotics, identified only as Raoul, tricked him into purchasing the alleged murder weapon as a sample to be used in illicit rifle sales. He said he gave the rifle to Raoul, an anti-Castro Cuban, in Memphis the day before King was shot. Under extensive committee questioning, Ray’s explanations for damaging allegations, many of them apparently documented, were surprisingly weak, consisting often of implausible coincidence or simple unsubstantiated denials. The absence of any fingerprints besides Ray’s own rifle, the rifle found outside the (Unintelligible word). However it was clearly shown by testimony that there had been tape put on the rifle to cover fingerprints, and Ray said that a man in a store offered him a rifle to look at to see if he would be interested. Very clever. Only by the assertion that Raoul wore bandages on the fingers was his defense. I would say that’s a hell of a- uh- a pretty good uh, defense. Committee Chairperson Representative Louis Stokes, black sellout who’s under a great deal of fire, great deal of fire, Democrat, Ohio, trying to save himself from another- a number of governmental investigations and newspaper smears, is par- trying to play the- the- the Uncle Tom role well. Ray was striking- was stalking King for some time before the murder, especially from the March 29 purchase of the high-powered rifle in Birmingham, Alabama until the killing April 4. Stel- uh, Stokes charged that Ray did not go from Birmingham to Selma as he testified, but to Atlanta, then to Selma and Memphis paralleling King’s movements. However, there were two Ray’s that were identified at different places at different times, almost identical in appearance. My, my, what fascism can do these days when it wants to frame someone. Ray contended his travel had nothing to do with King, and he was not in Atlanta on April 1, it had to be someone else. And of course, the person that testified said it was someone that resembled Ray. He went so far as to say that it was proved he was in Atlanta. He would take responsibility. If it was re- if it was proved he was in Atlanta, he would take the responsibility for the King case. Stokes then, in good Uncle Tom fashion, then produced blow-ups of laundry receipts from Atlanta, made out to Eric Gault, one of Ray’s aliases, dated April first. Again, he said that- Ray had said that this man had asked him to put his hands on these and to look them over, days before. Hmm, very interesting. When the clothes were dropped off, and April 5, when they were picked up, Ray admitted that he dropped off clothes at the laundry but said it could have been- it couldn’t have been on April 5- 1. He admitted picking up his clothes on April 5. Ray and his attorney, Mark Lane, seemed stunned at this point, challenging the validity of the evidence. This clear evidence, said James [Mark Lane], attorney, our good friend who has been the chief spokesperson and the most prominent lawyer to open up these investigations of murder against Martin Luther King and Malcolm X and Senator [Robert F.] Kennedy and President [John F.] Kennedy. He said it’s quite possible to put fingerprints, and there’re all sorts of devices to put fingerprints on cards and make it appear that someone was at some place at a certain time. Challenging the validity of the evidence heatedly, Mark Lane did, but ineffectively, said the New York Times. Throughout the hearings, Lane was involved in repeated procedural wrangling with the committee, criticizing its use of excerpted versions of documents and raising ob- objections to what he considered unacceptable standards of evidence and questioning.
Lane later tore into the committee, after it read a 21-page interview with a former London police inspector, Alexander Eist, E-i-s-t, who watched at- Ray from his arrest. From the day of his arrest, he was assigned to watch his every move – wonder why? That seems rather uncommon – and he said that Ray admitted to him that he had killed Martin Luther King because he hated blacks and that he expected to get a lot of publicity and money because of it. That’s ridiculous. Nobody would’ve thought that- even USA has to act like it’s got some justice. He would’ve known he would’ve had to go to jail for some time. Claims refuted. Lane reformed- informed the committee he had just talked long distance with a lawyer, a London lawyer, who told him Eist was fired from his job because he took bribes and invented all confessions, and this was confirmed by the New York Times. I would think the New York Times would begin to doubt the credibility of the opponents of Ray and our good friend Mark Lane, rather than Ray.
God, it’s so, so easy to frame anyone, and some of you are so damned foolish, you want to go back, you want to do this, you want to do that. You don’t realize what you’re talking about. It’s too damned dangerous.
Anyway, Lane charged that by reading Eist’s statement before, checking his record, the committee was guilty of the most irresponsible and outrageous behavior in the history of the United States Congress. Eist later maintained to the press that his story was true, but offered no documentation. Ray denied having to talked to Eist about the murder. He had never met the man, said he, and he had a witness to that effect. Subsequent witnesses refuted Ray’s claim that he was at a gas station at the time King was shot. Coy Dean Cowden testified that he had lied when he’d told Lane and the National Enquirer that he had seen Ray and his white Mustang at the station, claiming that he had been asked to tell the story by a private investigator writing a book on the King case. It is interesting to know that this Coy Dean Cowden who changed his story that he gave in the original trial of James Earl Ray, now is worth two hundred thousand dollars. Mighty interesting. He claims now that he had been asked to tell the story by a private investigator writing a book on the Martin Luther King case. A second eyewitness who claimed Ray was at the station, Thomas Wilson, died two weeks ago under mysterious circumstances. And that’s very convenient. Anybody with their right mind would know that this is a government conspiracy. The man was just a young man in his thirties, and he dies under mysterious circumstances. I tell you, America has already gone fascist, and you damn fools that talk about going back there are idiotic. You ought to prefer to go deep, deep into the jungle before you would think going back to a state that can do this kind of thing to people. (Pause)
Wilson- let me see, I ought to get back here- I’m- Someone was asking me a question. Hold for just a- (tape edit) -an eyewitness who had claimed Ray was at the station and talked with him at great length. Thomas Wilson died two weeks ago conveniently under mysterious circumstances, but the committee produced testimony claiming Wilson himself was somewhere else at the time. Now that’s very strange. Why didn’t they produce the evidence long time before now? The co-owners of the station- the co-owners of the station denied that a white Mustang was at their station before the shooting. Everybody is lying now, and they gave testimony under penalty of perjury. It is also noted, said the New York Times, but they still doubt Ray’s testimony, that each of these people are somewhat richer than they used to be.
The King hearings have been suspended until November, when it is expected Ray will testify again. The committee will now shift its focus to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in 1963. A serious of gunshot tests was conducted in Dallas at the scene of the murder August 20. The tests were ordered after a recent discovery that blips recorded on the police radio at the film of the shooting indicated that four shots were fired. Since the Warren Commission itself on the Kennedy assassination concluded that Lee Harvey Oswald was the lone glun- the lone glun- gunman, part- partly on the basis of the assumption that only three shots possibly were fired, the suggestion that a fourth shot was fired raises again a very strong possibility that there were accomplices to our President Kennedy’s death.
I just thought I’d give you some of the things that’s going on in this goddamned country. It’s outrageous. Outrageous, outrageous, outrageous. I’ll go on and give you something in Philadelphia now. That is something that should shock all the people.
Philadelphia protest draws four thousand. The people of Philadelphia are tir- taking to the streets to oppose the city’s notorious record of police brutality and killings against blacks. Continuation of organized resistance could spell trouble for law and order Mazor [Mayor] Frank Rizzo political ambitions, if he did not have such power with the Attorney General in Washington [Griffin Bell]. In the biggest public expression of outrage in the city of Philadelphia for many years, about four thousand, mostly black people, marched in desperation onto City Hall here on September 16, to denounce the police oppress [oppression] and to oppose Rizzo, Mayor Rizzo, fascist Mayor Rizzo’s ploy for a third term, and demand a selective boycott. The same day-
Stand by for just a moment, a question. (Pause) (tape edit)
-same day, following a greeting in Washington with a eight-member delegation of black elected fie- officials and community activists, US Attorney General Griffin Bell, who himself is under indictment by a court, but has refused to honor the court, announced the creation of a federal task force to investigate the reports of the police brutality in Philadelphia, but said it might take three or four years. Of course. We have had too many people, he said, from Philadelphia complaining about police brutality, and he said a lot of people just don’t like police, but we will look into it. State Representative Algea Dumas [phonetic], a delegation member, quoted Bell as saying- another delegate, Councilwoman Ethel Allen, said the delegation was informed the Justice Department had received 68 complaints and that 35 of them had not been investigated, (Pause) and many have not been reported- (covers microphone with hand, talks in background, unintelligible) -and many of them had not been reported. Young black youth who had been beaten and brutalized and left for dead by gangsters, trying to make the Philadelphia citizens to believe that gangs were killing other black youth. This is horror. We should be so grateful that we’re in a place of peace where our little children can’t grow up to be in gangs and drugs and be beaten by thugs and end up in jail as all black youth do now by seventeen. All black youth, half of them, better than half of them end up in prison.
Anyway, the immediate trigger to the mass action was a Philadelphia police brutal shooting and beating of a member of a religious movement. The demol- The demolition of their communal residence where they were living peacefully together and sharing, and the arrest of 38 passerbys [passersby] who just happened to look. The police immediately started beating upon them and arrested them and threw them into the paddy wagon in Philadelphia. The demonstration was primarily aimed at fascist Mayor Rizzo[‘s] attempts to amend the city’s charter to allow mayors a third term in office. The city council has called for a November referendum to decide the charter change, but he has enormous power, not only in Washington, but throughout the U- United States. Originally he had said he would not run for a third term, but would run on a white supremacist ticket as president, and there were several millions that had signed his petition. That shows you how much hate there is in USA. Earlier this year, Rizzo, Mayor of Philadelphia, said he would not seek political office after his second term ends this year, but would lead a movement to defend the rights of white people, called white supremacy. He evidently changed his mind for the time being. A demonstration was called by black radio stations, WDAS announcer Georgie Woods, State Representative Davey Richardson, Councilman Lucien Blackwell and housing activist Milton Street, among others, some who have disappeared very conveniently. They’ve just not been able to be found. Perhaps dropped in the bottom of the river.
The main focus of the demonstration was a call for mass voter registration to beat Rizzo November referendum. Representative Richardson, a staunch Rizzo fascist foe, called for a coalition of black or white, Puerto Rican or Chinese in a voter registration campaign to defeat Rizzo. That functional psychopath, as they called him, who occupies the second floor and metes out the so-called administration of justice of this city of Philadelphia that has turned into a dictatorship. The boycott call was specifically aimed at the First Pennsylvania Corporation Chairman, John Buntley [Bunting], and the city’s construction of a downtown shopping ma- mall called The Gallery. Oppo- Opponents of The Gallery says the prestige project shows the city’s disregard for deteriorating housing conditions all over Philadelphia. Bunting invited popular anger because the corporation’s First Philadelphia Bank shares represe- rep- responsibility for the financial crisis afflicting the city’s school systems and openly advocates re-delining- re- redelining [redlining] in the black and Third World communities. The bank, according to activists, also has investments, high investments. Rizzo has directed high investments in Philadelphia, in South Africa, which is the racist concentration camp government of the Union of South Africa. Observers say the demonstrators, which drew crowds from the streets along the- the paths, were- were largely spontaneous. However, two days earlier, a huge mass meeting attended by over thirteen hundred still mostly black. There still seems to be a great apathy of getting Puerto Rican, black, Chinese and white working class together, and that’s why the reporter feels that it will have little likelihood of success. And it was addressed by several speakers, including the leaders of the September 16 action.
Prepared for the march, the Philadelphia police did not leave the peaceful marchers alone. A large force of uniformed and plainclothes Philadelphia policemen were on the alert during the action. White long lines of police stood on each side of the street. Three busloads of police were put on standby. Plainclothes cops were scattered among the marchers, many of them beating down older, senior citizens. According to some activists, the march was a prelude to better organized action for the future to oppose police brutality and build a voter registration campaign which is very weak in the silly- city of Philadelphia, as well as most cities in the United States which has already gone fascist. S- They hope that they will be able to organize some community feeling in north Philadelphia, where the black association is having little effect at all. The People’s Defense Committee there and the Direct Action Committee have been calling on help, but at best they’ve only been able to get about a hundred supporters.That’s your USA. That’s your USA that you glorify, and I want you to stomach it and read it and know it and quit your damned dreaming and quit saying, well it never happened to me. It’s changing. I don’t care how Uncle Tomish you are and how-
(tape edit)
– all and elite and how prestigious and how white you talk and how much you think you can get by, you’re going to get it too. Believe me, when it comes, as our doctor [Larry Schacht] here, white doctor, he should know. Doctor Lang- Doctor Lane said all black people will be destroyed. They have methods in foods, that I just told you in the news earlier. N- They can give you food poisoning in foods directed towards different ethnic groups. You just die, fall over in the table. It’s not difficult at all to get rid of those you don’t want. The neutron bomb blows up the whole ghetto. That’s an easy way too. But there’s a little radiation there, so thefood poisoning would be better. You’re damned fools, and some of you are Uncle Toms and you’ve been Uncle Toms too long, and it’s high time that you hear the news. I gave you direct news from Philadelphia. And I hope that you realize Philadelphia’s supposed to be called the City of Brotherly Love, and I want everybody from that region to read it closely, everybody from Philadelphia to study it closely and scrutinize it absolutely, so that you stand up for Peoples Temple and this great new community which can protect you from all harm. I love you very much.
End of tape
Tape originally posted May 2009