[XXPANTHAXX]

By J. Marquardt
Oakland, Calif.
Published May 28, 2005 8:53 AM

Hundreds of people packed an Oakland church May 20 to
celebrate the release of a new audio documentary about civil-
rights leader Robert F. Williams. The documentary is
titled “Robert F. Williams—Self-Defense, Self-Respect & Self-
Determination (as told by Mabel Williams).”

Organized and funded by several foundations, including the
Paul Robeson Fund for Independent Media and the Freedom
Archives, the event brought together at least three
generations of progressive activists and artists, primarily
from the Black communities in the San Francisco Bay area.

In the late 1950s, Williams became pre sident of the Monroe,
N.C., chapter of the NAACP. At that time, the African
American neighborhood of Monroe was sometimes attacked by
groups of Ku Klux Klan. When North Carolina Gov. Luther
Hodges did nothing to stop the attacks, Williams and the
local NAACP chapter formed a National Rifle Association
chapter and trained their members in using firearms.

In the summer of 1957, when a Klan motorcade attacked the
home of NAACP member Dr. Albert E. Perry, an armed defense
squad drove them off. Klan night riding came to a sudden stop
in Monroe.

This famous incident electrified many Black people and
identified Williams with armed self-defense for Black people.

Mabel Williams, who had been together with Robert Williams
for almost 50 years when he died in 1996, spoke eloquently of
the historic struggle in Monroe in the late 1950s and through
the 1960s. The government’s phony charges for an alleged
kidnapping, but really for their militancy, forced the couple
into exile in Cuba. There they became de-facto representatives
of the oppressed and working class people in the United
States.

She said that everywhere they went—Cuba, China, Vietnam and
African countries—Williams told her that he did not want to
represent the “ugly America” but be a good ambassador “for
our people and for the whole human race.”

The Williams’ son, John C. Williams, told the audience what
it was like to be raised by his activist parents. Forced into
exile in Cuba, the Williams family saw firsthand what a
socialist government can do for its citizens and guests.

John Williams also recalled the struggle to integrate a
public swimming pool back in Monroe. Black people were
forbidden in the pool because the white racists spread the
lie that Blacks would leave an untidy discolored ring on the
sides of the pool. By contrast, Williams said, the public
schools and recreation areas were integrated in Cuba.

Other speakers included world-renowned activists and artists
Amiri Baraka and Amina Baraka, and Yuri Kochiyama. Kochiyama
spoke about Black freedom fighter Assata Shakur, herself now
living in exile in Cuba, and the $1 million bounty the FBI
recently place on her life. Quoting Cuban president Fidel
Castro, Kochiyama said, “Nothing will happen to her—she will
be protected.”

Amiri Baraka recalled his many years of friendship with
Robert Williams, whom he first met in Cuba in the early
1960s. He pointed out that Robert F. Williams was an advocate
for armed self-defense before Malcolm X became known and
before the emergence of the Black Panther Party.

Baraka also talked about the Montgomery, Ala., bus boycott,
reminding the crowd how truly correct Williams was in
promoting the idea of “treat people as they treat you.”
Racist White Citizens Councils and KKK members—also known as
the state police—burned and bombed homes and shot dead or
beat to death Black people. Baraka compared these acts of
terror to the present international activities involving the
terrorist Luis Posada Carriles’ attacks on socialist Cuba.

All the participants shared the sentiment of Robert F.
Williams’ words on the banner hung in the front of the
church: “We are going to have justice or set the torch to
Racist Amerika. Let our battle cry be heard around the world—
Freedom, freedom, freedom now or death.”