• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

On a Move

Website of the MOVE Organization

  • Home
  • About MOVE
  • MOVE 9
    • Chuck Africa
    • Debbie Africa
    • Delbert Africa
    • Eddie Africa
    • Janet Africa
    • Janine Africa
    • Merle Africa
    • Mike Africa
    • Phil Africa
  • John Africa
  • Mumia
  • Ramona Africa
  • Store
  • Support
  • Video/Audio
You are here: Home / Archives for philadelphia

philadelphia

New Movie About MOVE & Mike Africa: 40 Years a Prisoner

Tuesday, February 16
6pm EST / 5pm CST / 3pm PST.
The event will include welcoming and discussion with Michael Africa, Jr. himself!

Please register for the Zoom event at tinyurl.com/ILPS40Years

The Committee to Stop FBI Repression is a member group of the International League of Peoples’ Struggle (ILPS). 

Film also showing on December 3, 2020, at 9pm on HBO. More film events will be listed on this, the MOVE website (run by Friends of MOVE).

For more info: Mobilization4Mumia@gmail.com and (215) 724-1618

Filed Under: advocacy, event, philadelphia Tagged With: 2020, 40 Years a Prisoner, Mike Africa Jr, MOVE 9, MOVE Organization, Philadelphia Film Festival

Free Mumia! Rally & March.

Sat., July 4, 2020
12 Noon

1401 JFK Blvd., Philadelphia, PA
See directions/map

For more info: Mobilization4Mumia@gmail.com and (215) 724-1618

Filed Under: advocacy, event, philadelphia

Delbert Africa Passes Mon., June 15, 2020

  • Delbert Africa & daughter, Yvonne Orr-El (Tribune Photo/Abdul R. Sulayman)
Delbert Africa with his daughter and MOVE family

Delbert Africa passed away last night on Monday, June 15, 2020. He was at home with his family around him. Delbert Africa was an early counterpart 42 years before George Floyd. Besides his original, brutal attack by Philadelphia police, Delbert was deliberately killed, methodically assassinated, by officials at the State Correctional Institution – Dallas as part of the government’s plan to get rid of all MOVE men they could get their hands on.

Delbert was receiving care for cancer at the end of his prison sentence at the local hospital. There the doctors and nurses said the prison provided a lot of wrong treatments on Delbert and they couldn’t even understand why the prison did what the doctor and staff did. But, MOVE knows, and Delbert’s supporters know why–it’s murder by prison officials. The same fate that Phil Africa and Merle Africa suffered. The same fate that is occurring to Black men and women all over America by brutal, racist police, and the system they serve.

The MOVE Family
Long Live John Africa Forever!

MOVE member Delbert Africa speaks at a press conference after parole from prison.
Mumia Abu-Jamal Remembers Delbert Africa
MOVE Organization Press Conference on Murder of Delbert Africa
Delbert Africa, Warrior for the people!
By Betsey Piette posted on June 17, 2020, Workers World Newspaper

Filed Under: Delbert Africa, featured news, philadelphia Tagged With: Delbert Africa, MOVE, MOVE Family, Yvonne Orr-El

Special WURD Broadcast Weds., May 13, to Commemorate the 35th Anniversary of the MOVE Bombing.

MOVE members will speak.

WURD can be heard on 900AM, 96.1FM, or https://wurdradio.com. The day will be structured within a historical and chronological context, placing guests in the order in which they appear in the MOVE narrative. Read more.

10am – 11pm:
In the beginning, there was John Africa.

11am – 12pm:
DELBERT AFRICA
JANINE AFRICA
EDDIE AFRICA
JANET AFRICA

1pm – 2pm:
PAM AFRICA
CARLOS AFRICA

3pm – 4pm:
CONSUEWELLA AFRICA
RAMONA AFRICA

5pm – 7pm:
Interviews with a wide array of stakeholders who were directly involved. Archival audio, live interviews and video.

The day of programming is sponsored by Resolve Reporting Collaborative. Read more.

Filed Under: event, Featured Event, philadelphia Tagged With: 35th Anniversary, Carlos Africa, Consuewella Africa, Delbert Africa, Eddie Africa, Interviews, Janet Africa, Janine Africa, John Africa, MOVE, MOVE bombing, MOVE Organization, Pam Africa, WURD

Join the MOVE 9. Remember the 35th Anniversary of the MOVE Bombing.

Program with MOVE members and Philadelphia guest speakers.

Join us online to watch this stirring event. 6 pm. Click below:
https://www.facebook.com/tez.thewriter/videos/840597689760144

https://instagram.com/tez_thewriter
To see the program you have to have Instagram. Then click “Like to see his page. Once you do that you’ll see a red-ringed circle “LIVE” up top, click that and you can see it! (See photo below)

Filed Under: event, Featured Event, philadelphia Tagged With: Carlos Africa, Cherri Gregg, Delbert Africa, Eddie Africa, Janet Africa, Janine Africa, Linn Washington, Marcia Dyson, Ramona Africa, Tez_TheWriter, Wallo 267, Walter Palmer

Interview with Debbie Africa, Mike Africa Sr and Mike Africa Jr

February 26, 2019
Reprint from Global Research News Hour

“There are so many injustices in this system, man, about the things they do to people, the harm they cause to people. It’s not just MOVE that are treated horribly like this.” – Mike Africa Sr, MOVE 9 member interviewed

Global Research: It’s a pleasure to have you on our show, thank you so much for making the time to speak with our listeners

Mike Africa Sr: You got it, man! On a move!

Debbie Africa: On A Move!

Global Research: Debbie, Mike Sr, please, if you could, could you convey to our listeners the feelings that you experienced on having finally being released and being reunited with each other and with your kids and grandkids for the first time after 40 years behind prison walls?

Debbie Africa: Relief. I always tell the story that when I was first sent to prison in …1978, my oldest child was only 2 years, she wasn’t even 2 years old yet. And Michael Jr wasn’t born yet. So, I was pregnant with him. I had a two year old baby that I was holding when the raid took place, and she was taken from me. And – my daughter was taken from me.

And, without even realizing how long I felt so heavy, when I finally got released it was like a weight just came off of my heart, and that’s really all I can explain to you. As soon as I walked out that door, Michael Jr was there and the family was there – his wife, his children, which are my grandchildren, it was just like the weight was just lifted up off of my heart … it was just a really great feeling, to know that they finally, finally did something they were supposed to do. Release us.

Read (and hear) the rest of this interview: https://www.globalresearch.ca/black-history-trump-era-resistance-mumias-plight-and-freedom-for-the-move-9/5669694

Filed Under: Debbie Africa, Mike Africa Sr, news, philadelphia Tagged With: Debbie Africa, Global Research, Mike Africa Jr, Mike Africa Sr, reunited

‘I’m ecstatic’: black liberation prisoner Mike Africa Sr released after 40 years

Reprinted from The Guardian
October 23, 2018
By Ed Pilkington

Member of the radical Philadelphia-based group Move 9, sentenced after violent confrontation with police in 1978, reunited with wife Debbie Africa and son Mike Jr

Move 9 prisoner Mike Africa Sr and his wife Debbie Africa reunited in Philadelphia after 40 years in prison. Photo: Tommy Oliver

 

Mike Africa Sr has become the second member of the Philadelphia-based group of black radicals known as the Move 9 to be released from prison, more than 40 years after they were arrested for the death of a police officer in one of the most dramatic shootouts of the black liberation era.

He was paroled from SCI Phoenix prison in Pennsylvania on Tuesday morning [October 23, 2018] to be reunited with his wife Debbie Africa, who was also let out on parole in June having been arrested alongside him at the climax of a police siege in 1978. They were joined by their son, Mike Africa Jr, who until Tuesday had never spent time with both parents in the same room.

“I’m ecstatic coming from where I was just a couple of hours ago,” Mike Sr told the Guardian, speaking from his son’s house outside Philadelphia. “I wasn’t convinced in my mind that this would happen until I walked out the prison gates.”

He said it was amazing to be reunited with his wife, who was held in separate women’s prisons for 40 years. “I missed her and I loved her. She’s been my girl since we were kids. That’s never wavered at all.”

Debbie Africa said she was overwhelmed to have her family back.

Mike Africa Sr’s release marks a big step in the struggle of black militants who are still behind bars decades after they were arrested for police killings and other violent acts in the late 1960s and 1970s. The Guardian highlighted their plight in July.

Eighteen individuals, including two Move women, Janine Phillips Africa, and Janet Hollaway Africa, remain in prison. Many of them insist they are innocent of the charges brought against them.

In the case of the Move 9, they were convicted collectively of the death of a police officer, James Ramp, in the 1978 siege of their group home in Philadelphia even though only one shot killed him. Debbie Africa was eight months pregnant at the time.

Mike Africa Sr’s parole is of even greater consequence for his family, and especially for his son Mike Africa Jr, who for 40 years has never seen both of his parents together or out of prison. He was born in a cell where his mother Debbie gave birth to him a month after she and her husband were arrested during the siege.

For three days Debbie kept her baby son concealed in the cell, hiding him under the covers, until she was forced to hand him over to prison guards. With both parents imprisoned until the eve of his 40th birthday, Mike Jr effectively became an orphan of the black liberation struggle.

He was raised by relatives and other members of Move and now lives with a family of his own outside Philadelphia.

“I’m having an out-of-body experience right now,” Mike Jr told the Guardian as he drove his father back to his home to be reunited with Debbie. “I’m floating over the top of the car.”

He said that this was what he had waiting for more than four decades – to be together for the first time with both his parents. “I’ve always hoped for this, but I never knew that it would happen,” he said.

Mike Africa Sr with Debbie Africa
Mike Africa Sr with Debbie Africa: ‘I missed her and I loved her – she’s been my girl since we were kids – that’s never wavered at all.’ Photo: Tommy Oliver

 

The 1978 siege of the Move 9 house in the Powelton Village neighborhood of Philadelphia was one of the most violent and visceral incidents of the years of black liberation struggle. At the time, 12 adults and 11 children were living in a communal house, along with 48 dogs.

Move was a unique organization that mixed revolutionary ideology better associated with the Black Panther party with care for nature and the environment better associated with flower power and the hippy movement. The group still exists today, largely in the Philadelphia area, and continues to campaign for the release of its remaining members behind bars.

Mike Sr’s release reduces the number of still-incarcerated Move 9 members to five. In addition to his parole and that of his wife, two others have died behind bars from health complications related to their imprisonment – Merle Austin Africa, in March 1998, and Phil Africa in January 2015.

Brad Thomson, of the Chicago-based People’s Law Office, who was part of the legal team presenting the released prisoner, said that Mike Sr’s record in prison was exceptional, making him a prime candidate for parole. “With this decision, the parole board recognizes that Mike, like Debbie, and the rest of the Move 9, poses absolutely no threat to the community.”

The siege that led to the incarceration of five Move men and four women occurred on 8 August 1978. Tension had mounted for months between the commune and Philadelphia police following complaints from neighbors and fears that the group was stockpiling weapons.

The order was given for hundreds of police officers to go in and evict the residents by the notoriously hardline then mayor of Philadelphia, the city’s former police commissioner Frank Rizzo. In the melee, Ramp was killed.

Mike Africa Jr
Mike Africa Jr: ‘I’m having an out-of-body experience right now.’ Photo: Mark Makela

All nine adult members of Move living in the house were held responsible for the shooting and sentenced to 30 to 100 years. At trial they told the jury that they had no working firearms in the house, though that was disputed by prosecutors.

With Mike and Debbie Africa now released, thoughts are turning to the remaining five Move members still in prison. Petitions for habeas corpus have been filed in federal court on behalf of the two women, Janine Phillips Africa and Janet Hollaway Africa, challenging recent parole denials.

Bret Grote, of the Abolitionist Law Center, another lawyer for the Move 9, said: “This historic release of Mike Africa renders the parole board’s decision to deny the rest of the Move 9 all the more incomprehensible. For example, Janet and Janine have both maintained prison records that are as exemplary as Mike’s and essentially identical to that of Debbie, yet they were inexplicably denied parole in May.”

Seven years after the siege of the Move house, a second trauma was dealt to the black radical group. The then mayor of Philadelphia, Wilson Goode, gave the go-ahead for an incendiary bomb to be dropped on top of another Move house.

It caused an inferno that killed 11 people, including five children. More than 60 houses in the predominantly African American neighborhood were razed to the ground.


Read more by Ed Pilkington for The Guardian
“A siege. A bomb. 48 dogs. And the black commune that would not surrender”
Forty years ago, Philadelphia erupted in one of the most dramatic shoot-outs of the black liberation struggle. Ed Pilkington tells the surreal story of the Move 9 – and what happened to them next. Read more.

Filed Under: info, news, philadelphia Tagged With: Abolitionist Law Center, Bret Grote, Debbie Africa, Ed Pilkington, Mike Africa Jr, Mike Africa Sr, MOVE 9, parole for move 9, The Guardian

Pack the Court and Streets for Mumia on Mon., December 3, 2018!

Monday, December 3, 2018 – 8 am,
Court Hearing for Mumia,
Criminal Justice Center,
1301 Filbert Street,
Room 1108,
Philadelphia, PA;
Get directions

 

In a court case that could eventually lead to Mumia Abu-Jamal’s freedom, Judge Leon Tucker has ordered the District Attorney’s office to present new testimony in reference to Ronald Castille, on August 30, 2018. Castille is a former PA Supreme Court judge who refused to disqualify himself when Mumia’s case came before the court despite having been the Philadelphia District Attorney during Mumia’s prior appeals. The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that such conduct is unconstitutional.

A New Chance for Mumia
Click graphic for large version

 

 

 


A recent update on Mumia Abu Jamal’s case:
Philadelphia DA’s office stonewalls at hearing for Mumia Abu-Jamal
May 3, 2018

Filed Under: advocacy, event, philadelphia Tagged With: Court Hearing, Larry Krasner, Mumia Abu-Jamal, Philadelphia, Ronald Castille

Help Ramona Fight For Her Life

The MOVE Organization is informing our supporters, sympathizers and all those in solidarity with the cause of revolution, that our much beloved Ramona Africa, MOVE’s Minister of Communication, survivor of the May 13, 1985, holocaust, has been hospitalized as a result of health complications coming from a condition called PTSD (post traumatic stress disorder). A direct result of the ongoing war waged on our Move Family by this government (we’ve lost 24 members to date). Two died in prison under suspicious circumstances termed “cancer.” Now Ramona is diagnosed with “cancer” and she’s again battling to be a survivor.

Ramona needs funds for a hospital bed, therapy to be able to walk again, skilled nursing full-time care and many other health needs. Please donate to her Go Fund Me page at https://www.gofundme.com/helpsaveramonaafrica.  Please share this information widely.

If there’s any questions or concerns people want to address please contact Alberta Africa or Sue Africa at these numbers: (215) 387-4107 or helpramonaafrica@gmail.com.

On The Move Long, Live John Africa!

Our much beloved Ramona Africa
Ramona Africa in hospital

Filed Under: philadelphia Tagged With: cancer, hospital, PTSD, Ramona Africa

40 Year Commemoration for MOVE 9

Commemorate 40th Year Anniversary Frame Up & Incarceration of MOVE 9Sunday, August 5, 2018

Fairmount Park:
9:30 am: Yoga
10 am: 5K Run, Walk, Bike with MOVE & Philly ABC
Register at phillyabc.wordpress.com/rdtw

Shoemaker Charter School:
3-5 pm: Panel
5-7 pm: Concert

Get flyer.
For more info: mikeafricajr@gmail.com and http://onamove.com/40-years/

Filed Under: philadelphia

  • Go to page 1
  • Go to page 2
  • Go to page 3
  • Interim pages omitted …
  • Go to page 6
  • Go to Next Page »

Primary Sidebar

Donate to MOVE Online

It is PayPal secure & quick-- Thank you and Onamove!






Search

All MOVE members freed from prison! LLJA!

Debbie Sims Africa, June 2018

Mike Africa Sr, October 2018

Janine Phillips Africa

Janet Holloway Africa, May 2019

Eddie Goodman Africa, June 2019

Delbert Orr Africa, January 2020

Chuck Sims Africa February 2020

And, we always remember the two MOVE members who died suspiciously in prison:

Merle Africa, March 1998
Phil Africa, January 2015

42 years after the Aug. 8, 1978 confrontation in Philadelphia, FINALLY all of the “MOVE 9” prisoners are out of prison!

Also, check out: move9parole.blogspot.com for more information.

The MOVE family was bombed in an attempt to stop their work to free all Life.  They remain steadfast. Long Live John Africa!

Life

All living beings, things that move, are equally important, whether they are human beings, dogs, birds, fish, trees, ants, weeds, rivers, wind or rain. To stay healthy and strong, life must have clean air, clear water and pure food. If deprived of these things, life will cycle to the next level, or as the system says, ‘die’. - John Africa

Copyright © 2021 · The MOVE Organization · onamovellja@aol.com