The Final Call

Newark activists push 381-day protest for jobs, change

By Saeed Shabazz -Staff Writer- | Last updated: Jan 26, 2012 - 5:36:13 PM

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NEWARK (FinalCall.com) - A determined group of protestors here pledged to stay the course for 381 days as they stage the “Daily People’s Campaign for Jobs, Peace, Equality and Justice” to dramatize the “impact of draconian public policies on ordinary people.”

The protests started here June 27, 2011 under the guidance and sponsorship of the Peoples Organization for Progress. A national jobs program tops the list of the core issues fueling the campaign.

The “Monthly Black Worker Report” published by the University of Calif.-Berkeley Center for Labor Research and Education reported last September that 16 percent of the Black population was unemployed. Unemployment for Black women is 14.3 percent, for Black men it is 17.9 percent and for Black teens, 16-19, joblessness is 44.2 percent.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports nationally 13.3 million Americans are unemployed, but notes there is a “hidden unemployment” statistic and nationally 15.5 million people are unemployed.

“There are too many politicians that don’t want a jobs bill to happen right now,” Jon Levine, activist and union member told The Final Call. “What we have learned is that politicians vote correctly when they feel pressure from the streets,” he added.

“People have learned through campaigns such as Occupy Wall St. and Occupy Newark that their energy can be translated into political legislative action,” said New York State Senator Bill Perkins.

State Sen. Perkins has participated in Occupy demonstrations in NYC and several forums on job creation. “It is good that people are marching in the streets of Newark; but they must also stay engaged with their local politicians,” said Sen. Perkins.

Lawrence Hamm, Peoples Organization for Progress chairman, told The Final Call the idea for the 381-day campaign came from the historic examples of the 1955 Montgomery Bus Boycott, which lasted 381 days, and the 1968 Washington, D.C. Poor Peoples Campaign conceived by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

“We were inspired by the Montgomery bus campaign because it was strategically successful,” Mr. Hamm said. Activists wanted to show the community historical examples of protracted struggle so people would understand change does not come instantly, he said. But people can make a difference if they stay committed, Mr. Hamm added.

The Montgomery Bus Boycott led to the Supreme Court ruling that Alabama’s policy of racial segregation in public transportation was unconstitutional, striking down separate but equal laws in the U.S.

The Poor People’s Campaign lost most of its push after the assassination of Dr. King, but tents and shacks were erected on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. for six weeks. Some 50,000 people participated in a march.

Dr. Akil Kokayi Khalfani, professor of sociology and director of the Africana Institute at Essex County College, told The Final Call there is a long history of Newark activists leading the national struggle against oppression and for equality.

In “The Black City: Remembering Newark in the Era of Black Power,” Emma Curran Donnelly Hulse writes, “Newark defined Black Power as self-determination, an attempt on the part of African Americans to take control of their lives and communities.”

“Today there is a coalescing in the struggle for change that makes what is happening in the streets of Newark unique,” Dr. Khalfani said. Seeing the daily commitment by activists may lead people to get involved, he said. “Hopefully people will eventually see that if they get involved the impact will be greater,” Dr. Khalfani added.

Newark, New Jersey’s largest municipality, is the 63rd largest U.S. city and home to the third largest insurance industry, according to census figures. But while Newark is one of the nation’s major air, shipping and rail hubs, Black unemployment stands at 12 percent.

According to the census, Blacks are a 54.2 percent majority of the city’s 227,140 people. A census footnote describes its major challenge: “Poverty remains a consistent problem in Newark.”

Dr. Khalfani said staying in the streets for 381-days will build a spiritual connection between activists and the community. “We will be able to eventually detach ourselves from our emotions that someone must provide for us and begin to move towards providing for ourselves,” he said.

According to Student Minister Lawrence Muhammad of Muhammad Mosque No. 25, the city activists involved in the 381-day campaign are “very dedicated and very knowledgeable.”

“I believe that those standing out here in the cold will become dedicated helpers for the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan’s call for us to ‘do for self,’ ” Mr. Muhammad said, standing with a protest poster in one hand and Final Call newspapers in the other.

With the economic crisis, activists realized “we had to do things differently. It requires a multi-level approach, definitely we must develop entrepreneurs, and in the immediate sense we must create jobs,” Mr. Hamm said.