A salute to Herman Wallace
2013Jeff Mackler 2013-11Read it in the scan (PDF at ETOL), page 5 →
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Herman Wallace, a murder frame-up victim, spent 41 of his 73 years in soli darity confinement at the notorious Loui siana State Penitentiary at Angola. He was released from prison just three days before his death from liver cancer, Oct. 4 in New Orleans. The prison warden had initially defied a federal court order au thorizing Herman’s release but finally re lented after the judge threatened him with contempt of court.
In 1972 Herman Wallace had been serv ing a sentence at Angola for armed rob bery, when a correctional officer was stabbed to death in a prison uprising. In ... Malalai Joya tour (continued from page 3: “Thousands march for immigrant rights”) ternational surveys. The dreadful conditions have led to a rise in self-immolation by desperate women.
Joya emphasized that all three Afghan oppressors— the U.S., the Taliban, and the Karzai government—col laborate to reduce or eliminate public education, es pecially for women. Public schools are increasingly privatized; young women who attend any schools are frequently murdered, and schools in general are sub jected to terror attacks or bombings by all the forces of reaction.
And as if war, poverty, and repression were not enough, Joya cited reports that Afghanistan produces 90% of the world’s opiate drugs and that over 1 million Afghans are addicts, the world’s top per capita users. Many of the addicted people are women and children, while treatment facilities are woefully inadequate.
Joya concluded that after 12 years of U.S./NATO occu a trial two years later, Herman and two other prisoners were convicted of in volvement in the killing despite a lack of evidence to that effect. Wallace and his co-defendant Albert Woodcox had been members of the Black Panther Party and consistent organizers for better prison conditions.
In a monstrously vindictive gesture, on Oct. 3—the day before Herman Wallace died—a grand jury in Louisiana’s West Feliciana Parish re-indicted him for the killing of the prison guard.
Socialist Action is proud to have been a supporter of the freedom of Herman Wal lace and the other Angola 3 members. We organized a jam-packed public forum in San Francisco in 2001 for Robert King, also one of the Angola Three, who spent 29 years of his life in prison—an innocent man and victim of capitalism’s racist and pation, rather than conditions improving for Afghans, particularly women and children, they are deteriorat ing in all areas, except for the gains in power and wealth by the U.S.-backed thieves and war criminals.
“In my country,” she asserted, “It takes time, but the resistance of ordinary Afghans—students of the uni versities, democratic-minded intellectuals, and some political parties—is rising against the occupiers. More and more people are standing up against the U.S. and NATO, and their lackeys, puppets, the warlords, and the Taliban.”
“Afghans have a proud history of fighting against all occupations,” Joya repeatedly noted. “People are tired, wounded, and hate all kinds of these terrorists. But they will stand up one day more and more against them.” She pointed to the hopeful demonstrations of “hundreds of thousands” of Afghans against the U.S./NATO occupa tion, the Taliban, and the Karzai government that have been initiated by the Solidarity Party of Afghanistan and several other resistance groups.
The UNAC/Afghan Women’s Mission tour included