ALL OUT FOR DEC. 11: GROWING ACTIVISM FOR MUMIA

By Leslie Feinberg

Mark the date: Dec. 11. Spread the word far and wide.

Bus info:  Boston

Everyone is needed at regional protests that day in Philadelphia, Chicago and Oakland in support of Mumia Abu- Jamal.

Organizers are already planning buses, car caravans and other forms of travel to bring supporters to the three regional demonstrations.

When it looked like Abu-Jamal might be executed Dec. 2 by lethal injection, widespread protests demanding a stay of execution and a new trial temporarily stopped the clock.

But the clock will start ticking again unless support continues to grow for the most well-known of all U.S. political prisoners.

For more information on the nearest Dec. 11 event, contact organizers in New York at (212) 633-6646; in San Francisco at (415) 821-6545; in Philadelphia at (215) 476-8812; or email npcny@peoplescampaign.org . On the Web, visit www.mumia.org  and www.peoplescampaign.org .

These organizing sites--and Workers World newspaper--are among the few sources of real news about the tide of activism on behalf of Abu-Jamal.

If instead you pick up a copy of the Washington Post or the L.A. Times, or tune into CNN or a local news broadcast, it's a rare day in which there's any coverage at all--even a thoroughly biased report--about Abu-Jamal's case.

Yet there's a swell of organizing on behalf of Abu-Jamal across the U.S. and around the world.

ALL THE NEWS THAT'S FIT TO PRINT?

Here are several recent protests that most people in the U.S. didn't hear about from the monopolized corporate media.

Scores of Parisian activists occupied and held the editorial offices of the International Herald Tribune for two-and-a-half hours on Nov. 15.

The 60 demonstrators included Julia Wright, daughter of renowned African American author Richard Wright.

The group first occupied the ground-floor lobby of the newspaper's main office in a Parisian suburb.

The activists demanded that the newspaper print a petition calling for a new trial for Abu-Jamal and articles about the international support movement for the U.S.-held political prisoners.

Officials of the newspaper refused to discuss the matter while protesters were occupying the building. But Abu- Jamal's supporters refused to budge.

In fact, they stormed the main first-floor newsroom in order to press their demands. The French national riot police finally evicted them.

As a result of the militant action, the IHT was forced to cancel its late edition. Instead, management ordered workers to send the 7 p.m. edition--which usually only circulates in Asia--to all distribution points.

Workers in the printers' union were so angered about their bosses calling in riot cops against the protesters that they delayed the transmission to non-Asian sites.

SCOTLAND: `THE ELITE ARE RESPONSIBLE'

A week before the action in Paris, Scottish supporters of Abu-Jamal picketed McDonalds and American Express locations in downtown Edinburgh.

During the Nov. 6 protests, some activists boldly went inside both businesses and leafleted workers and customers. The American Express office window was left adorned with posters and leaflets.

In an Internet report about the Free Mumia activities, the Autonomous Centre wrote that U.S.-owned businesses were not targeted "for nationalistic, anti-American reasons. It is because the owners of U.S. multinationals and the U.S. government and judicial authorities are all part of the same ruling class.

"This elite are ultimately responsible for the unjust legal system, biased against poor people, Black people and political dissidents, which has condemned Mumia to death."

The report concluded that Black men make up 40 percent of death row prisoners in the United States. Yet they make up less than 6 percent of the population.