Black community facing colonial oppression in US: Activist

Press TV has interviewed Jesse Nevel, with the African People's Solidarity Committee from Tampa, Florida, about the new wave of anti-police brutality protests in the United States.

The following is a rough transcription of the interview.

Press TV: We are seeing a spike in violence in these protests and there’s been the recent retaliatory actions that we’ve seen against police. It seems the black community is frustrated that this problem is persisting way too long without getting properly addressed, your thoughts?

Nevel: First of all, I like to say greetings to you and Press TV on behalf of the African People's Solidarity Committee, the organization of white people working under the leadership of the African People Socialist Party. And as the chairman of the African People’s Socialist Party, Omali Yeshitela, has said the conditions that you’re describing today began with the initial assault on Africa 600 years ago by European powers that created this social system of colonialism and oppression, which African people faced everywhere they are for the benefit of the white population today.

And what we have seen with these recent incidents of police violence are only the latest in a long, long uninterrupted continuous history of genocidal state terror against the black or African community inside this country that stretches back to the origins of the United States itself, which was built on the enslavement of the African people and the genocide against the native people of this land. And the resistance that we’ve seen by African people such as Micah X Johnson in Dallas, Texas, represents resistance by a colonized, oppressed and occupied people to their colonial occupiers, no different from the resistance of the Palestinian people to the Israeli occupation of their homeland, for the Afghan people to the US military occupation of their lands.

Press TV: Why do you think this resistance, this escalation in violence, is taking place now? Is it just after all these last couple of years of infinite protests that the black community is finally getting frustrated to the point where they see all the walking, all the rallies, all the protests are not leading to any kind of substantive change; so, now some few people are resorting to this kind of violence?

Nevel: I think the limitations of attempting to reform a system that was built on oppression have been exposed for all the world to see. And as the Uhuru movement has been saying nothing short of total liberation and self-determination for African American people including black community control of the police will end this carnage that we see every single day in this country. And there are also a lot of white people out there who are outraged by what’s happening. And those white people need to join under the leadership of the African liberation movement that is struggling to end this social system not be satisfied but just continuing to march holding a Black Lives Matter sing or claiming that we are anti-racist, because the problem is colonialism, a social system built on the oppression of the African people. And the only thing that will ever change that is African liberation and self-determination and we owe reparations to African people.

Press TV: Barrack Obama is leaving office pretty soon here and it’s funny that a lot of stuff is happening under his watch as the first black president. Could he have been more aggressive in pushing for reform of these police departments or whatever the appropriate reform need be to deal with this in a more proper manner?

Nevel: To the contrary, Obama is part of the strategy of the intensification of the colonial oppression of African people. He is what chairman Omali Yeshitela eight years ago called neo-colonialism or white power in black face. He represents the same social system and he is actually a cover that this system of white power has put up in their desperation to mask themselves with somebody who resembles the people who are being oppressed for the system to survive. He does not represent the interest of African people. He represents the interest of the Wall Street and the Pentagon and the white ruling class in this country. And that’s why under his administration you have actually seen an intensification of wars all over the world including the main war that this country rests upon, which is the war against the African community inside this country.

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