Great Lakes Underground Railroad Map, 1800s
The US government does not want a flood of modern day African “Americans” as refugees in Canada.
A decade ago, the hush of the Ontario snowfall was comforting.
Swinging the rental truck onto the roadways, we both could feel a new day dawning. It was stirring and peculiar, realizing that up to 100,000 Africans, many led by Harriet ‘Moses’ Tubman had fled this way 150 years prior.
Exiting America as the calendar flipped from’97 to ‘98, the future wasn’t clear but Aisha and I thought the FBI troubles were behind us.
Indeed, the lessons from the streets and society of Toronto began to be learned once we had further difficulty from Down Below.
In time, we beat back the attack.
After all, we had been battling the Washington DC boys and girls, the feds, for 6 gruelling years. Toronto, the metropolis that is larger population-wise than Chicago was new terrain. The energy to begin defending against Aisha’s job sabotage, phone call intercepts and blocked calls (locally and to the US), post mail theft, being followed by strangers, apartment break ins and such in another country is another matter. By mid 1998 we were United Nations Political Refugee claimants within UN Convention guidelines. We started the international law process with the Immigration and Refugee Board in the vast country with only 30 million people.
Immediately stopped from getting what all other claimants get, no cost legal counsel, we scrambled and found a lawyer. Trauma counseling, and when we qualified, help recovering economically was denied us. The Canadians made it clear that they didn’t want African so called Americans seeking political asylum.
Marshalling every ounce of our determination, we didn’t fall apart mentally.
We were found eligible to bring the claims and had an extended 1999 hearing.
Asserting ourselves and winning several legal fights, we had our appeal to the Ottawa federal court voided illegally. At the time of George Bush being installed, the Canadians expelled us from the country with 30 days notice even though we were residents for 3 years. The letter we received spelled out that we were banned from returning to the land we were born in, the USA. See http://www.geocities.com/windparade2003/wickedcanadaletterpage.htm
The Toronto 8 are not going to be famous as the Jena 6.
Who they are is as controversial as the subject of African so called Americans seeking another nation’s protection from the racist American regime.
In a strange case of the bizarre, White male US military asylum seekers in Canada, most in the corporate media hub Toronto, speak of an “underground railroad” of Iraq War military resisters. In today’s fleeting soundbites of cybernews, they are fascinating subjects to a still warped look at what the USA really is.
Few know Gary Freeman is confined for three and a half years in a Toronto jail.
Although the number of African people from America who left the USA for Canada is not known, many like Gary got out because of police and court persecution. During 1969, fearing unfair imprisonment and torture by the Chicago police, he fled. Marrying and raising a family, he worked for years as a librarian in the bustling Toronto Reference Library near downtown Bloor Street. Then the arrest for a 35 year old incident, an alleged shooting of a police officer, arose. At present the 56 year old man continues to fight extradition to the city that produced police killers of Black Panther Party leaders Fred Hampton and Mark Clark the same year Gary left, 1969. Chicago police, police associations and patriots of America are baying at the red white and blue moon for Gary to be put into America’s hands. John Burge, the notorious Chicago police captain and torturer of Black men for decades, has never been given anything other than a pension to spend at his Florida home.
Tonye Allen and Ann Brown, journalists bound for South Africa after a few late 2006 days met the Toronto police. The noted 46 year old photo journalist for magazines such as Vibe was beaten severely, pepper sprayed and his partner shoved around. This occurred in the street as they hailed a taxi. As is common in the country he comes from, he was charged by the police for assaulting them. Passports and identification were then seized from the couple (they cannot leave Canada). Tonye remains in jail a year after the incident outside of a Jarvis Street hotel. Court dates in 2007 could result in Tonye Allen spending up to ten years in Canadian prisons. The silence from African so called American media and writers is thick enough to cut with a knife.
The other five of the Toronto 8 cannot have their identities revealed.
Three are children who know little of the geopolitical threats aimed at African so called Americans for fighting and preserving their lives. Canada, the only country most of the people have been able to easily escape to after battling racial discrimination and suffering retaliation by US custom and law, has been given instructions.
Some fascist order has decreed that Mommy, Daddy and the children must never be allowed to present a Political Refugee case before the Canadians with UN Convention directives in their hands. A ruthless US Homeland Security awaits at the border and assists in raids within Canada to haul in autistic six year olds.
And so, the family which must go unnamed lives underground, freezes with no heating in the Canadian winter, (minus 25C not uncommon) is malnourished, is fearful of attending school, scrounges for quiet work and keeps well away from police and suspicious Canadians.
The Toronto 8 don’t have much of a choice.
The world sees them, as it did Aisha and I a decade ago, as non persons before international law. Human Rights are for Burmese, Tibetan, East Timorese or Darfuris but not Africans and Native People in America.
In Canada, the country with the ‘nice’ image worldwide, there are many more than eight Africans from America living in hiding.
For the moment, the Toronto 8 come to mind.
It’s Winter in Canada.
29 October 2007
From Exile,
Bankole
www.geocities.com/exiledone2002
RESOURCES:
1. Gary Freeman/Joseph Pannell: http://www.web.net/~freemandrum/fact_sheet.html
2. Tonye Allen and Ann Brown: http://www.tonyeallenandannbrown.blogspot.com/
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