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News| Race In America | Farrakhan Lays Out Broad Plan for Black America

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Posted Oct. 15, 2005
– The Minister Louis Farrakhan, in his long-awaited speech to the thousands gathered at the mouth of the U.S. Capitol Saturday, told Black Americans that the problems of their communities will persist unless “we see the need to organize and mobilize.”

“We’re not gathered here on this mall because something is right in America,” he said. “This whole meeting today is about repair …repair of ourselves.... God has given us the medicine to heal our condition. (Whites) cannot heal us because they have no power to heal themselves.

“We want more than an apology for slavery; we want more that a monument… We want you to acknowledge the wickedness of slavery and the transatlantic slave trade…We want you to acknowledge that we fought in all your wars for freedom that we don’t yet have.”

But this government “is never going to give us reparations,” Farrakhan said. “If you want to make reparations real, go back home and organize.

The spending power of African Americans is about three-quarters of a trillion dollars, so Black society has the money, Farrakhan said. “With the will and the unity, we can repair what has been broken.”

And if we were to stop “blood-letting among ourselves, then we could stop White police from shooting us down,” Farrakhan said.

Reiterating his earlier suspicions that the levees were deliberately sabotaged to allow poor communities in New Orleans to be washed away, Farrakhan called for an official investigation, saying, “We want to know what happened to the levees … we don’t want to guess.

 “Now they’re saying they don’t want to build the Ninth Ward (the impoverished, mostly Black region of New Orleans),” he said. “Where will these people go? (The government) won’t do what it needs to do unless we do what we need to do.

He called for a class-action suit of the Department of Homeland Security by the poor, now-homeless residents of New Orleans.

 “We charge America with criminal neglect,” Farrakhan said.

He said that 2,500 children are still missing from the hurricane and that we must demand an accounting. “We cannot stand by and let it be said that 2,500 of our babies are missing,” Farrakhan said.

Black Americans can never allow another catastrophe to hit without being prepared, Farrakhan said.

His solution: for African Americans to develop various ministries designed specifically to address our specific needs. They include:

Ministry of Health and Human Services: Noting that there is a lack of health care among Black, Brown, Red and poor people, Farrakhan said, “We in leadership and in organizations are not to master the people but to serve the people.” He reminded that Fidel Castro offered to send scores of doctors to the United States to help the victims of Katrina but that the help was refused by the U.S. government. “We should find a way to accept the doctors of Castro,” Farrakhan said, pointing out that hospitals are closing in Washington, D.C., and across America. As for 500 scholarships that Castro offered for Black Americans to study medicine in Cuba (with the only stipulation being that graduates return home to practice in their communities), Farrakhan said we should capitalize on that too.

Ministry of Agriculture: Black farmers are suffering. We need to tie land to the needs of the city. Native Americans, Farrakhan said, “have the largest track of land,” and they are willing to lease millions of acres to African Americans. “We must produce food for ourselves” and begin canning, freezing produce and building supermarkets that would employ Black people and guarantee healthy foods. “This we can do. We just need to think out of the box,” Farrakhan said.

Ministry of Education: “Western education has run its course for Black Americans,” Farrakhan said. “We need a new educational paradigm … to re-educate our children.”

Ministry of Defense: “Brothers are born soldiers, but they’re fighting the wrong war,” Farrakhan said. “:Bring our boys home and put them in a ministry of defense in every city and town to defend our communities.”

Ministry of Arts and Culture: The goal of this department would be to reinforce the notion that “there is a bigger purpose than popping our fingers and shaking our you know what,” Farrakhan said. The ministry would promote the genius of our culture – song, dance, poetry and other ideas.

Ministry of Trade and Commerce: This ministry would promote business and development in Black communities as well as in the Caribbean, Africa, and Central and South America. Our clothes and shoes are made somewhere else, Farrakhan said. “Suppose we pooled some of the dollars we spend foolishly … we could open clothing stores all over America,” he said.

Do you agree with Farrakhan's plan? Click "Discuss Now" to talk about it. Then Click the Poll link to the left to weigh in again.

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