Almost a fifth of the oil imported by the U.S. comes from Africa, and in the decade to come this percentage will rise. The eastern part of Nigeria, from which Big Oil has pumped more than a trillion dollars worth of black gold since the 1960s, remains the poorest part of the country, and one of the most ravaged and polluted on earth. Thousands of gas flares have burned for decades, generating acid rains that have poisoned fisheries and crops. The land is crisscrossed by thousands of miles of leaking pipes and dotted with oil slicks. The air is unbreathable, cancers are endemic, there are no schools or hospitals and life expectancies are among the lowest on the African continent. Shell Oil is on trial in a New York courtroom, accused of hiring the Nigerian government to murder its own citizens for protesting the pollution of their environment and demanding a share of oil revenues be spent where the oil is extracted.
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Members of the African People's Socialist Party and its Solidarity Committee were indicted on charges of acting under the influence of the Russian government. They vigorously defended themselves in…
African People's Socialist Party indictments, Cuban solidarity, and the 1970 police killings at Jackson State.
Omali Yeshitela is chairman of the African Peoples Socialist Party, leader of the Uhuru Movement, and the Black is Back Coalition.
Netfa Freeman just returned from Cuba, where he was one of the coordinators of the National Network on Cuba's delegation to the U.S. May Day Brigade.
C. Liegh McInnis is a poet, short story writer, and former instructor at Jackson State University.
