George Jackson University

by Abdul Olugbala Shakur
Board members:

• Abdul Olugbala Shakur: Chancellor (AbdulOlugbalaShakur@yahoo.com)
• Dr. Donald R. Evans: 2nd Chancellor (www.NAAFRA.org)
• Akili Mwalimu Shakur: Vice Chancellor (akilishakur@gmail.com)
• Adbul Jabbar Caliph: Vice Chancellor (443) 826-9654
• Kilaika Baruit: Executive Director, Financial Administrative Department (angelnicholes@gmail.com)
• Jamaa Malik Shakur: Public Affairs Director
• Mabu Joka Shakur: Director of Personnel
• M. Ajanaku: Chief Facilitator

Overview

George Jackson

For the past 20 years or more, many people – prison rights activists in particular – have spoken on the importance of education as the most effective tool towards combating recidivism, but unfortunately many have only paid lip service to this cause, a cause that we can no longer afford to ignore or pay lip service to without concrete action. We, as New Afrikans, are initiating a concrete action beyond rhetoric and lip service. We are reinstituting the concept of transforming the entire U.S. prison industrial slave complex into the largest progressive educational institution in the country with emphasis on Afro-centric and Pan-Afrikan studies and New Afrikan political education.
Our primary objectives at this moment will be five-fold:

1. To eradicate functional illiteracy among New Afrikan (Black) prisoners.
2. To eradicate cultural ignorance among New Afrikan prisoners.
3. To transform the New Afrikan criminal mentality.
4. To assist in the rebuilding and stabilization of the New Afrikan communities.
5. To prepare New Afrikan prisoners for release – reducing New Afrikan recidivism.

The GJU primary curriculums:

1. Afro-centric/Pan Afrikan studies
2. New Afrikan Criminology 101
3. New Afrikan Political Science and Education
4. Reading and Writing
5. Math and Science
6. Computer Science
7. Green Technology
8. Sociology
9. Psychology
10. Horticulture/Landscaping/Gardening
11. Cooking/Nutrition
12. Health and Fitness
13. Business and Finance
14. Arts and Crafts
15. Pre-Release Survival Programs

Administrative protocols

All GJU faculty and registered students will adhere to the following rules and protocols. Any violations will result in immediate expulsion or probation. The circumstances will determine the particulars. We intend to develop and implement additional rules for both student and faculty, but the following rules and protocols are very essential to the integrity of the GJU:

1. NO registered student or faculty member will participate in gang activity (as defined by the GJU Disciplinary Board);
2. NO registered student or faculty member will participate in criminal activity (as defined by the GJU Board of Directors);
3. NO registered student or faculty member will engage in the sale or manufacture of any illicit drugs, including pills and marijuana, and not necessarily limited to these;
4. NO registered student or faculty member will engage in the use of hard drugs, including taking pills for the purpose of getting high;
5. NO registered student or faculty member will drink alcohol or smoke marijuana;
6. NO registered student or faculty member will be an informant, child molester, serial rapist, serial killer, baby killer, woman beater, pimp, elder abuser, or in protected custody or on sensitive needs yards! If anyone has any questions concerning this, you can contact our chancellor directly.

People, the George Jackson University (GJU) is no longer a theory. New Afrikan community activists across the country are pledging their support and joining our GJU. It is now an inherent component within the National Afrikan-Amerikan Family Reunion Association (www.NAAFRA.org). It is rapidly expanding. The time for talk is over.

Abdul Olugbala Shakur

If you truly believe in the education of New Afrikan/Black prisoners, reducing New Afrikan recidivism and eradicating Black-on-Black gang violence, then join and/or support the GJU. We don’t need your lip service. We need your support! Race, nationality or gender is not relevant as long as you adhere to the GJU Administrative Rules Manual, which is also included in our GJU pamphlet. We are presently seeking to fulfill the following positions: 1) GJU State Representatives; 2) GJU Curriculum Developers; 3) GJU Coordinators; 4) GJU Volunteers; 5) Fundraisers; 6) Donors; 7) Sponsors. Please contact Sista Kilaika if you are interested, at angelnicholes@gmail.com. Note: We are not presently enrolling any students. Our present focus is building the GJU structure and outside support network.
Send our brother some love and light: Abdul Olugbala Shakur (s/n J. Harvey), C-48884, PBSP-SHU D1-119, P.O. Box 7500, Crescent City, CA 95532. The GJU pamphlet tells this history: In 2003, Shakur with several other prisoners and outside advisors developed this concept, to transform the entire U.S. prison industrial slave complex into the nation’s largest university, which they initially called University of the Mind. Under that title they received minimal feedback, so in the summer of 2003 they renamed it The George Jackson University, and within six months they received over 20,000 enrollment applications. Soon CDC had sabotaged development of the university by prohibiting Shakur from corresponding with anyone related to GJU. After settlement of several lawsuits challenging the restrictions, GJU is now being relaunched.

George Jackson an excuse for CDCR abuse of solitary confinement

by Steve Martinot
To the Ammiano-Hancock legislative hearings on solitary confinement:
I would like to bring to your attention a category of violation of constitutional rights being perpetrated on prisoners by the California prison system, as it relates to the malicious and arbitrary use of solitary confinement. This category of violation refers to a prisoner’s use of the name George Jackson in personal correspondence and to possession of any of George Jackson’s books.
In one instance of which I am aware (and I am withholding the name until I can be sure that no repercussions will descend on the prisoner), a copy of one of George Jackson’s books was found in a prisoner’s cell. The book had been mailed to him, had gone through the mail room and through administrative filtering and been given to him.
But when a guard found the book in his cell, the prisoner was charged with gang activity, under the pretense that George Jackson, when alive, had been a member of a (mythical) gang called the Black Guerrilla Family. Having been charged with gang activity, the prisoner was then thrown in solitary confinement and has been there for five years now. This happened in Corcoran.

It is not simply the abuse of solitary confinement by California prison administrators that you need to be concerned with, but a systematic criminality – the use of torture and the violation of constitutional rights – on the part of those administrators under the pretense of curtailing presumed “gang” activity.

I have recently heard from another prisoner in Pelican Bay that his mail has been stopped and seized because he mentioned George Jackson’s name in a letter. This prisoner, who has already been in solitary for some 12 years because of his political writings, was also involved in forming an educational endeavor called The George Jackson University, whose purpose is to study the structures of power and of racialization in the U.S.
A pamphlet describing this university, which this prisoner was sending to a person on the outside, was seized by the prison administration, and further time in solitary was imposed on the prisoner. These seizures are in direct violation of the sanctity of mail under federal law.
These are also direct violations of human rights, direct violations of the right of free speech and free thought, and involve criminally arbitrary actions on the part of the prison administrations. To use pretended gang affiliation to put a person in solitary confinement is to punish the person for having exercised protected rights under the Constitution.
If this kind of violation of human rights occurs with any routine frequency, then it is not simply the abuse of solitary confinement by California prison administrators that you need to be concerned with, but a systematic criminality – the use of torture and the violation of constitutional rights – on the part of those administrators under the pretense of curtailing presumed “gang” activity.
It is my understanding that suits have been filed against these prison administrators in both these cases. The length of time it takes for such suits to move through the court system simply adds to the unjustified and unjustifiable torture to which these prisoners are being subjected by being held in solitary confinement. That slowness of court procedure should be considered another abuse of solitary confinement itself.

To use pretended gang affiliation to put a person in solitary confinement is to punish the person for having exercised protected rights under the Constitution.

The state of California needs to bring its state agencies, like the prison administration, into accord with basic civilized procedure. That would mean, in this case, regularizing the use of solitary confinement and bringing it into accord with the United Nation’s declaration that more than 15 days of solitary confinement constitutes torture.
Steve Martinot, a human rights activist, organizer and writer and retired professor, machinist and truck driver, is now organizing neighborhood assemblies in the East Bay. He has published eight books, the latest being “The Need to Abolish the Prison System,” and can be reached at martinot4@gmail.com.

http://sfbayview.com/2014/george-jackson-university/