After Queen's Death, Victims of British Imperialism Share Why 'We Will Not Mourn'

"This is Queen Elizabeth's legacy. A legacy of colonial violence and plunder. A legacy of racial segregation and institutionalized racism."

Brett Wilkins
September 9, 2022

photo credit: Bill Smith

As millions of Britons and admirers the world over mourned Queen Elizabeth II's death Thursday, others—especially in nations formerly colonized by the British Empire—voiced reminders of the "horrendous cruelties" perpetrated against them during the monarch's reign.

"We do not mourn the death of Elizabeth, because to us her death is a reminder of a very tragic period in this country and Africa's history," declared Julius Malema, head of the left-wing Economic Freedom Fighters party in South Africa.

"Elizabeth ascended to the throne in 1952, reigning for 70 years as a head of an institution built up, sustained, and living off a brutal legacy of dehumanization of millions of people across the world," he continued. "During her 70-year reign as queen, she never once acknowledged the atrocities that her family inflicted on native people that Britain invaded across the world," Malema noted. "She willingly benefited from the wealth that was attained from the exploitation and murder of millions of people across the world."

"The British royal family stands on the shoulders of millions of slaves who were shipped away from the continent to serve the interests of racist white capital accumulation, at the center of which lies the British royal family," Malema added.

Larry Madowo, a CNN International correspondent from Kenya, said during a Thursday broadcast that "the fairytale is that Queen Elizabeth went up the treetops here in Kenya a princess and came down a queen because it's when she was here in Kenya that she learned that her dad had died and she was to be the queen."

"But that also was the start of the eight years after that, that the... British colonial government cracked down brutally on the Mau Mau rebellion against the colonial administration," he continued. "They herded more than a million people into concentration camps, where they were tortured and dehumanized."

In addition to rampant torture—including the systemic castration of suspected rebels and sympathizers, often with pliers—British forces and their local allies massacred unarmed civilians, disappeared their children, sadistically raped women, and clubbed prisoners to death.

"And so," added Madowo, "across the African continent, there have been people who are saying, 'I will not mourn for Queen Elizabeth, because my ancestors suffered great atrocities under her people that she never fully acknowledged that."

Indeed, instead of apologizing for its crimes and compensating its victims, the British government launched Operation Legacy, a massive effort to erase evidence of colonial crimes during the period of rapid decolonization in the 1950s-'70s.

"If the queen had apologized for slavery, colonialism, and neocolonialism and urged the Crown to offer reparations for the millions of lives taken in her/their names, then perhaps I would do the human thing and feel bad," tweeted Cornell University professor Mũkoma wa Ngũgĩ. "As a Kenyan, I feel nothing. This theater is absurd."

Aldani Marki, an activist with the Organization of Solidarity with the Yemeni Struggle, asserted that "Queen Elizabeth is a colonizer and has blood on her hands."

"In 1963 the Yemeni people rebelled against British colonialism. In turn the Queen ordered her troops to violently suppress any and all dissent as fiercely as possible," he tweeted. "The main punitive measure of Queen Elizabeth's Aden colony was forced deportations of native Yemenis into Yemen's desert heartland."

"This is Queen Elizabeth's legacy," Marki continued. "A legacy of colonial violence and plunder. A legacy of racial segregation and institutionalized racism."

"The queen's England is today waging another war against Yemen together with the U.S., Saudi Arabia, and the UAE," he added.

Melissa Murray, a Jamaican-American professor at New York University School of Law, said that the queen's death "will accelerate debates about colonialism, reparations, and the future of the Commonwealth" as "the residue of colonialism shadows day-to-day life in Jamaica and other parts of the Caribbean."

Numerous observers noted how the British Empire plundered around $45 trillion from India over two centuries of colonialism that resulted in millions of deaths, and how the Kohinoor—one of the largest cut diamonds in the world, with an estimated value of $200 million—was stolen from India to be set in the queen mother's crown.

"Why are Indians mourning the death of Queen Elizabeth II?" asked Indian economist Manisha Kadyan on Twitter. "Her legacy is colonialism, slavery, racism, loot, and plundering. Despite having chances, she never apologized for [the] bloody history of her family. She reduced everything to a 'difficult past episode' on her visit to India. Evil."

An Indian historian tweeted, "there are only 22 countries that Britain never invaded throughout history."

"British ships transported a total of three million Africans to the New World as slaves," he wrote. "An empire that brought misery and famine to Asia and Africa. No tears for the queen. No tears for the British monarchy."

Negative reaction to the queen's passing was not limited to the Global South. Despite the historic reconciliation between Ireland and Britain this century, there were celebrations in Dublin—as a crowd singing "Lizzie's in a Box" at a Celtic FC football match attests—and among the Irish diaspora.

"I'm Irish," tweeted MSNBC contributor Katelyn Burns, "hating the queen is a family matter."

Welsh leftists got in on the action too. The Welsh Underground Network tweeted a litany of reasons why "we will not mourn."

"We will not mourn for royals who oversaw the protection of known child molesters in the family," the group said.

"We will not mourn for royals who oversaw the active destruction of the Welsh language, and the Welsh culture," the separatists added.

Summing up the sentiments of many denizens of the Global South and decolonization defenders worldwide, Assal Rad, research director at the National Iranian American Council, tweeted, "If you have more sympathy for colonizers and oppressors than the people they oppress, you may need to evaluate your priorities."

This article originally appeared at CommonDreams.org. Originally published on September 9th 2022. It is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License. 

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The BROOKS BLACKBOARD's website,  our INTEL page, OPEN MIND page,  and LIKE and FOLLOW our Facebook page.

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'Can't Be Allowed': Alarm as Mississippi Gov. Floats Privatization of Jackson Water System

"The response to a water crisis can't be turning the city water supply into a for-profit industry."

KENNY STANCIL

September 6, 2022

Water pressure has been restored in Jackson, but residents of Mississippi's capital still lack safe drinking water and now must contend with the threat of privatization—an idea floated by Republican Gov. Tate Reeves and denounced by critics on Monday.

Although "the risk with respect to quantity of water has not been eliminated, it has been significantly reduced," Reeves said at a Labor Day press conference in the city. "People in Jackson can trust that water will come out of the faucet, toilets can be flushed, and fires can be put out."

While the immediate, flood-induced emergency appears to have been contained, Reeves made clear that when it comes to addressing the Jackson water system's longstanding issues, he is "open" to allowing a profit-maximizing corporation to take over a life-sustaining public good.

"Privatization is on the table," the governor said. "Having a commission that oversees failed water systems as they have in many states is on the table. I'm open to ideas."

The underfunded and understaffed O.B. Curtis Water Treatment Plant is now "pumping out cleaner water than we've seen for a very, very long time," said Reeves, citing local health officials. The governor expressed hope that the boil-water notice affecting more than 150,000 people since July 29 could be lifted within "days, not weeks or months."

"We know that it is always possible that there will be more severe challenges," he added. "This water system broke over several years and it would be inaccurate to claim it is totally solved in the matter of less than a week."

Flooding—made more common and intense by the fossil fuel-driven climate emergency—was the proximate cause of the recent loss of water pressure in Jackson, but disinvestment, the ultimate cause of the city's ongoing water crisis, can be traced back decades.

As Judd Legum noted Tuesday:

The integration of public schools in the 1960s prompted an exodus of affluent whites from Jackson, eroding the city's economic resources. Jackson's declining economic fortunes also prompted the departure of middle-class Blacks, causing an overall population decline. The city went from over 200,000 people in 1980 to less than 150,000 people today. More than a quarter of the population lives below the poverty line. Mississippi is the poorest state in the nation, but Jackson is even poorer than the state as a whole. Per capita income is just $21,906.

But while the city's population and tax base shrunk, it still has 114 square miles of aging water infrastructure to maintain. The state, dominated by Republicans, has been largely unwilling to help a city populated by Black Democrats. In 2021, for example, intense storms left Jackson residents without drinking water for a month. The city asked the state for $47 million in funding for emergency repairs. Mississippi allocated $3 million.

On Monday, Reeves acknowledged that "there are indeed problems in Jackson that are decades old, on the order of $1 billion to fix." The governor failed to mention, however, how the GOP's refusal to provide financial support at the scale required has helped perpetuate the dangerous status quo.

Reeves' privatization proposal, first reported by the nonprofit outlet Mississippi Free Press, was quickly met with condemnation on social media.

"This can't be allowed to happen," tweeted Josh Potash, an educational strategist at Slow Factory, a social and environmental justice NGO. "The response to a water crisis can't be turning the city water supply into a for-profit industry."

Civil rights attorney Sherrilyn Ifill wrote on social media, "Beware privatization." She pointed to a 2019 report by the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, which found that the growing privatization of water infrastructure impedes "the human right to affordable, clean water."

According to Mississippi Free Press: "Jackson Mayor Chokwe Lumumba has repeatedly said he opposes totally privatizing the water system by selling it to a private company. But on August 8, he said that he would consider a 'maintenance agreement' with a private company for operations and management of the system to alleviate staffing shortages."

Reeves, meanwhile, repeatedly criticized the city in his Monday remarks, "citing its longtime water billing issues, staffing issues at the water plant, and a failure to provide the state or the federal government with a plan to fix the water system," the outlet added.

This is familiar territory for Reeves. Following the February 2021 freeze that left Jackson residents without safe water for a month, the governor said that the city needs to do a better job "collecting their water bill payments before they start going and asking everyone else to pony up more money."

However, Legum pointed out, Jackson's struggles to collect fees for water and to raise enough revenue to pay for routine maintenance can be attributed to Siemens, a multibillion-dollar corporation of the kind that Reeves has baselessly suggested could alleviate the city's water crisis.

As Legum explained:

In 2010, Siemens began pitching Jackson officials to hire the company to install all-new automated water meters and a new billing system. Siemens would also "make repairs to the city’s water treatment plants and sewer lines." Where would cash-strapped Jackson get the money for such a project? Siemens assured Jackson that the project would more than pay for itself. Jackson would have to pay Siemens $90 million—the largest contract in city history—but Siemens promised the new system would generate "$120 million in guaranteed savings" in the first 15 years, according to a lawsuit later filed by the city.

[...]

According to the city's lawsuit against the company, "[m]ore than 20,000 water meters were installed incorrectly or were unable to transmit meter readings to the system." That was about one-third of all meters in the city. Worse, the new meters "were also incompatible with the new billing system." Siemens, it seems, "had never paired the water meter and separate billing systems together, using Jackson as a '$90 million test case for an unproven system.'"

"In the end," Legum wrote, "Jackson was stuck with a $7 million annual bond payment [through 2041], a $2 million monthly shortfall in water fees, and a system of water meters that was not working."

Reeves, for his part, appears poised to forge ahead with little regard for history or democracy.

"I think there is an overwhelming desire for the leadership, those who represent Jackson and those who do not, to take action," said the governor.

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This article originally appeared at CommonDreams.org. Originally published on September 6th 2022. It is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License. 

Please support and visit 

The BROOKS BLACKBOARD's website,  our INTEL page, OPEN MIND page,  and LIKE and FOLLOW our Facebook page.

Follow me on Twitter at @_CharlesBrooks   

BLACK AUGUST REMINDS US THAT COINTELPRO DIDN’T END…

words by Charles Brooks

For the last forty-three years, the month of August has been observed as Black August to serve as a remembrance of George and Jonathan Jackson, the Black Prison movement and to highlight political prisoners. Black August is solidly connected to the Black prison movement that began behind the walls of San Quentin prison and to COINTELPRO that targeted George Jackson. George Jackson entered the California prison system as a prisoner and transformed into not just an imprisoned intellectual, but as a political prisoner.  Jackson, not only became politicized in prison but he became radicalized by his newfound reality, a sentence of one year to life…for a $70 robbery.   

Behind the walls, Jackson organized the prisoners and became a leader of the Black prison movement in San Quentin. His role there enabled his unique installation as the Field Marshal in the Black Panther Party’s Central Committee. It is Jackson’s political and radical transformation that brings our attention to the state’s response to his prison activism. 

His organizing activities were criminalized to justify COINTELPRO activities that viewed Jackson as a target for state violence. Just as radical Black political activism was deemed a threat and criminalized outside the prison walls, George Jackson pointed us to the criminalization of organizing activities behind the prison walls.

COINTELPRO not only enabled the murder of George Jackson but the increasingly number of political prisoners being incarcerated behind the walls as well. The FBI’s counterintelligence program commonly known as COINTELPRO, was in operation from 1956 to 1971: “The purpose of this new counterintelligence endeavor is to expose, disrupt, misdirect, discredit, and otherwise neutralize the activities of black nationalist organizations and groupings and their leadership, spokesmen, membership, and supporters.”  

COINTELPRO included an overarching range of illegal activities to achieve their goals; there was a

FBI relationship with local police along with network of informers and infiltrators who engaged in tapping telephones, fabricating mail correspondence, burglaries, along with a tactical campaign of disinformation, propaganda, surveillance, and harassment.  They targeted a long extensive list of organizations and activists in the civil rights movement, the student movement, and anti-war movements who were targeted for “neutralization”.  But the harshest and cruelest of COINTELPRO was reserved for members of Black radical organizations such as the Black Liberation Army (BLA), and Black Panther Party. 

Because of COINTELPRO, organizational financial resources were depleted due to the repeated arrests and convictions based on fabricated or withheld evidence. There was also the murder, exile and incarceration of political prisoners who languished behind the walls for over 20, 30, 40 and yes, 50 years.  Political prisoners were created by the state’s response of state repression, violence and incarceration to their political positions and actions of the late sixties and early seventies. As activists and organizers, they exercised a relentless pursuit of self-determination with a clear analysis of their current political, economic and social condition. They were committed to transforming an American apartheid society with their political activism and organizing.  As a result, their political activities were criminalized and were subsequently rendered, enemies of the state.   

Fifty years later, their status as political prisoners are denied by the government. Instead, they’re branded as criminals and/or domestic terrorists while disregarding COINTELPRO’s illegal activities that secured their incarceration.  Not only is their existence in denial by the United States government but on a broader level, there’s also the denial of human rights abuses on US soil and their disregard for certain international laws and treaties around human rights and political prisoners. 

Although, COINTELPRO officially disbanded operations in 1971, political surveillance continued under apparent ongoing COINTELPRO-like activities. For instance, there’s the historic Handshu case on NYPD’s surveillance and intelligence-gathering activities on political groups as well as the revelations of a NYPD police unit, known as the Black Desk, assigned to surveilling Black radical organizations.      

These COINTELPRO-like activities continued with targeting former political prisoners, such as Imam

Jamil Al-Amin in 1995, and Abdul Haqq  in 1996. Then, in the years after 9/11 there was the expanded

surveillance state launching widespread political surveillance and racial profiling of Muslims and Arabs. And, in more recent years, the implosion of Black Lives Matter anti-police protests triggered yet another round of targeted political surveillance best illustrated in a 2017 FBI report, “Black Identity Extremist.”  

But more recently, an early dawn FBI raid on the African People’s Socialist Party has been denounced widely by activists and organizations who quickly recognized the COINTELPRO-like pattern here. The African People’s Socialist Party is known for their extensive work in the Black community in St. Louis, and international work. They’ve been branded as pawns of the Russian government in the ongoing global game of chess, under the hollow pretext they were involved in Russia’s influence and role in undermining American elections.  

This early morning raid was conducted on the very same premise afforded only for those on the forefront of struggle for Black liberation. Black August reminds us, the FBI raid is yet another example of targeted Black folk who are under far more intense political surveillance for their constitutionally protected advocacy of exercising self-determination and black liberation. During Black August, we’re not only reminded of political prisoners, and their sacrifice but we’re also reminded of why they’re political prisoners. Most importantly, Black August presents another opportunity to amplify the fight to release political prisoners as central any movement advocating for human rights and anti-racism. 

Additional Reading:

How we found out about COINTELPRO,  Monthly Review

Race, Survelliance, and Empire, International Socialist Review

George Jackson FBI files

Books taken from cell of George Jackson, 8/21/71

Speaking Truth to Power: Political Prisoners in the United States, Dhoruba Bin-Wahad

True history of Black August, Mama Ayanna Mashama

Free the Spirit, August 1979 issue,

Imprisoned Intellectual: America's political prisoners write on life, liberation & rebellion, (Introduction), Dr. Joy James

New York Times Interview with George Jackson, June 13, 1971

Book: Soledad Brother: The Prison Letters of George Jackson

On 13th Anniversary of Last Minimum Wage Hike, Dems Urged to Raise 'Deplorable' $7.25 Floor

"They must immediately raise the federal minimum wage to at least $15 an hour. Our country cannot afford to reach a 14th anniversary of $7.25."

JAKE JOHNSON

July 24, 2022

Marking the 13-year anniversary of the last federal minimum wage increase in the U.S.—a meager boost from $5.15 to $7.25 in 2009—progressive campaigners on Sunday urged congressional Democrats to make another push to raise the national pay floor as inflation continues to diminish workers' purchasing power.

"Congress must act to raise wages for the tens of millions of workers who are struggling just to get by."

Progressive Lawmakers Push Biden to Stop Transferring Military Weapons to Cops

"Militarized law enforcement increases the prevalence of police violence without making our communities safer," 22 members of Congress asserted.

BRETT WILKINS
July 21, 2022

photo credit: Eli Christman

Congressional progressives this week urged top Biden administration officials to end the transfer of military weapons to local law enforcement agencies under a program that critics say disproportionately harms communities of color.

"It's time we demilitarize the police and abolish the 1033 program."

In a letter led by Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.), Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii), and Rep. Hank Johnson (D-Ga.), the 22 lawmakers called on Cabinet members to implement part of a May executive order signed by President Joe Biden aimed at reforming federal policing standards.

"Police militarization has never made our communities safer," Pressley tweeted. "It's time to stop transferring military-grade weapons to local police."

Not One Single Republican Votes for Probe of Neo-Nazis in US Military and Police

Zero House Republicans supported a measure requiring the Pentagon and federal law enforcement agencies to publish a report on countering white supremacist and neo-Nazi activity in their ranks.

KENNY STANCIL

July 14, 2022

photo credit:Anthony Crider

Zero House Republicans on Wednesday supported a measure requiring the Pentagon and federal law enforcement agencies to publish a report on countering white supremacist and neo-Nazi activity in their ranks.

Rep. Brad Schneider's (D-Ill.) amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for fiscal year 2023 directing the FBI, Department of Homeland Security, and Department of Defense "to publish a report that analyzes and sets out strategies to combat white supremacist and neo-Nazi activity in the uniformed services and federal law enforcement agencies" passed in a party-line 218-208 vote.

Flint Residents 'Disgusted' After Court Throws Out Indictments of Top Officials

"It has become increasingly clear that the judicial system is not a viable option for a poor majority Black community facing injustice," said Flint Rising.

photo credit: Water Alternatives

Flint residents expressed disappointment and disgust after the Michigan Supreme Court on Tuesday determined former state officials were not indicted properly—yet again delaying accountability for the city's water crisis.  "No more excuses. No more delays."

"This leaves no one criminally responsible for poisoning 100,000 people in one of the largest public health disasters in this nation's history," Flint Rising said in a statement Wednesday, adding that the group is "disgusted" by the 6-0 decision.

"It has been 2,986 days since the start of the Flint water crisis. Throughout the years, we've sent buses of Flint residents to our state and nation's capital, shared our stories, marched in the streets, and fought for reparations for our community," the group continued.

In 'Dangerous Decision,' Supreme Court Guts Protection of Miranda Rights

JULIA CONLEY

June 23, 2022

Legals experts warned law enforcement agencies will have "zero incentive" to ensure that a person being arrested is read their Miranda rights after the U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday handed down a ruling the ACLU characterized as a "dangerous" assault on long-established protections.

"The warnings mandated by the Supreme Court in Miranda have been part of the fabric of law enforcement interactions with the public for more than 60 years."

BROOKS BLACKBOARD RECENT POSTS

The BROOKS BLACKBOARD is an online political news and political education site with links to our news articles, analysis and books reviews. See the links below to our recent posts in May and June 2022, and take a look at our political education pages, INTEL and OPEN MIND.   

Juneteenth celebrates just one of the United States’ 20 emancipation days – and the history of how emancipated people were kept unfree needs to be remembered, too

Emancipation Day celebration, June 19, 1900, held in ‘East Woods’ on East 24th St. in Austin, Texas. Austin History Center

Kris Manjapra, Tufts University

The actual day was June 19, 1865, and it was the Black dockworkers in Galveston, Texas, who first heard the word that freedom for the enslaved had come. There were speeches, sermons and shared meals, mostly held at Black churches, the safest places to have such celebrations.

The perils of unjust laws and racist social customs were still great in Texas for the 250,000 enslaved Black people there, but the celebrations known as Juneteenth were said to have gone on for seven straight days.

The spontaneous jubilation was partly over Gen. Gordon Granger’s General Order No. 3. It read in part, “The people of Texas are informed that, in accordance with a proclamation from the Executive of the United States, all slaves are free.”

But the emancipation that took place in Texas that day in 1865 was just the latest in a series of emancipations that had been unfolding since the 1770s, most notably the Emancipation Proclamation signed by President Abraham Lincoln two years earlier on Jan. 1, 1863.