TheRepublic of New Afrika (RNA), founded in 1968 as theRepublic of New Africa, is ablack nationalist organization andblack separatist movement in theUnited States popularized by black militant groups. The larger New Afrika movement in particular has three goals:
Payment by the federal government of several billion dollars inreparations to African American descendants of slaves for the damages inflicted on Africans and their descendants bychattel enslavement,Jim Crow laws, and modern-day forms ofracism.
Areferendum of all African Americans to determine their desires for citizenship; movement leaders say their ancestors were not offered a choice in this matter after emancipation in 1865 following theAmerican Civil War.
The idea of the RNA arose following the events of the1967 Detroit riot.[3]: 276 It was the first separate nation declared by African Americans in the United States.[3]: 276
The Black Government Conference was convened by the Malcolm X Society and theGroup on Advanced Leadership (GOAL), two influentialDetroit-based black organizations with broad followings. The attendees produced a Declaration of Independence, a constitution, and the framework for aprovisional government.[3]: 276
The RNA elected black leaders from a number of different organizations as provisional government officials.[3]: 276 Robert F. Williams, then living in exile in China, was chosen as the first president of the provisional government; attorneyMilton Henry (a student ofMalcolm X's teachings) was named first vice president;[5] andBetty Shabazz, widow of Malcolm X, served as second vice president.Imari Obadele was its first Minister of Information.[3]: 267 An RNA delegation traveled to China to meet Williams in June 1968.[3]: 276 Williams accepted the position and proposed diplomatic initiatives for the RNA to undertake.[3]: 276
The Provisional Government of the Republic of New Afrika (PG-RNA) advocated/advocates a form of cooperative economics through the building of New Communities—named after theUjamaa concept promoted by Tanzanian PresidentJulius Nyerere. It proposed militant self-defense through the building of local people's militias and a standing army to be called the Black Legion; and the building of racially based organizations to champion the right ofself-determination for people of black African descent.[citation needed]
The organization was involved in numerous controversial issues. For example, it attempted to assistOceanhill-Brownsville area in Brooklyn to secede from the United States during the1968 conflict over control of public schools. Additionally, it was involved with shootouts atNew Bethel Baptist Church in 1969 (during the one-year anniversary of the founding) and another inJackson, Mississippi, in 1971. (It had announced that the capital of the Republic would be inHinds County, Mississippi, located on a member's farm.) In the confrontations, law-enforcement officials were killed and injured. Organization members were prosecuted for the crimes. The members claimed they acted in self defense.[6]
Queen Mother Moore was a founding member. She helped found the group and helped out in the group as much as she could.[citation needed]
Betty Shabazz, widow ofMalcolm X, was elected as second vice president of the first administration in 1968, working alongside Williams and Henry.[5]
Chokwe Lumumba, formerly Edwin Finley Taliaferro of Detroit, was elected as second vice president in 1971. He later became an attorney, working in Michigan and Mississippi in public defense. After settling inJackson, Mississippi, he was elected to the city council there. He was elected as mayor in 2013, dying in office in February 2014 of natural causes.
Safiya Bukhari, former Black Panther Party and Black Liberation Army member, founder of the Jericho Movement for U.S. Political Prisoners and Prisoners of War, and co-founder of theFree Mumia Abdul-Jamal Coalition (NYC) was elected as vice-president.
The Article Three Brief. 1973. (New Afrikans fought U.S. Marshals in an effort to retain control of the independent New Afrikan communities shortly after the U.S. Civil War.)
Obadele, Imari Abubakari.Foundations of the Black Nation, Detroit: House of Songay, 1975.
Brother Imari [Obadele, Imari].War In America: The Malcolm X Doctrine, Chicago: Ujamaa Distributors, 1977.
Kehinde, Muata.RNA President Imari Obadele is Free After Years of Illegal U.S. Imprisonment. InBurning Spear Louisville: African Peoples Socialist Party, 1980. pp. 4–28
Obadele, Imari Abubakari.The Malcolm Generation & Other Stories, Philadelphia: House of Songhay, 1982.
Taifa, Nkechi;Lumumba, Chokwe (1993) [1983, 1987].Reparations Yes (3rd ed.). Baton Rouge: House of Songhay.
Obadele, Imari Abubakari.Free The Land!: The True Story of the Trials of the RNA-11 Washington, D.C. House of Songhay, 1984.
New Afrikan State-Building in North America. Ann Arbor. Univ. of Michigan Microfilm, 1985, pp. 345–357.
"The First New Afrikan States". InThe Black Collegian, Jan./Feb. 1986.
A Beginner's Outline of the History of Afrikan People, 1st ed. Washington, D.C. House of Songhay, Commission for Positive Education, 1987.
America The Nation-State. Washington, D.C. and Baton Rouge. House of Songhay, Commission for Positive Education, 1989, 1988.
Walker, Kwaku, and Walker, Abena.Black Genius. Baton Rouge. House of Songhay, Commission for Positive Education, 1991.
Afoh, Kwame, Lumumba, Chokwe, and Obafemi, Ahmed.A Brief History of the Black Struggle in America, With Obadele's Macro-Level Theory of Human Organization. Baton Rouge. House of Songhay, Commission for Positive Education, 1991.
The Republic of New AfricaNew Afrikan Ujamaa: The Economics of the Republic of New Africa. 21p. San Francisco. 1970.
Obadele, Imari Abubakari.The Struggle for Independence and Reparations from the United States 142p. Baton Rouge. House of Songhay, 2004.
Obadele, Imari A., editorDe-Colonization U.S.A.: The Independence Struggle of the Black Nation in the United States Centering on the 1996 United Nations Petition 228p. Baton Rouge. The Malcolm Generation, 1997.
^abSalvatore, N. A. (2005).Singing in a Strange Land: C. L. Franklin, the Black Church, and the Transformation of America. New York: Little, Brown and Company.
Firing Line: The Republic of New Africa]William F. Buckley interviews Milton Henry, President of the Republic of New Afrika. Program number 126. Taped on Nov 18, 1968 (New York City, NY). 50 minutes. Available from theHoover Institution. The first 5 minutes are accessible instreaming RealAudio.
Note: Forms of nationalism based primarily onethnic groups are listed above. This does not imply that all nationalists with a given ethnicity subscribe to that form ofethnic nationalism.
![US States identified as subjugated national territory at the 1968 foundational conference[1]](/mt/?noimg=&dark=on&url=http%3a%2f%2fen.wikipedia.org%2fwiki%2fFile%3aRepublic_of_New_Afrika.svg)
