We Are SRDC
The Sixth Region Diaspora Caucus (SRDC) was founded in 2006 in response to an invitation from the African Union (AU) to the African Diaspora (people of African descent around the world) to become involved in the AU’s work toward uniting and lifting African people in the Continent and throughout the world.
While the AU did invite us to seek membership in it, the AU also said we in the Diaspora could not join it in the disorganized state we currently are in. We are scattered across the United States and around the world, as African-Americans, African-Caribbeans, African-Europeans, etc., with little conscious connection to each other. We need to become better organized if we are to become part of a world body like the AU which needs us to bring stability to Africa and not the chaos we currently seem to embody as a people. The AU also said it would not organize us; we must do that ourselves.
The AU did state several guidelines that we need to follow. They proposed that we would first become part of an advisory group that is composed of community organizations and representatives of the people “on the ground”, or the grassroots. The representatives who are part of this group must be elected by the people they represent. Thus, our representatives must be elected, not self-appointed or chosen by some elite group.
We proposed a method through which that would be accomplished. Local communities of African-Diasporans (Black people around the world) would meet in open public sessions (Pan-African Grassroots Assemblies, Town Hall Meetings or whatever they would be called) to discuss and determine the important issues to them in their local area, and would also nominate and elect representatives to take that message to national and, possibly, international conferences, meetings and other events. In the United States, local communities would be broken down into the 50 states plus the District of Columbia. Each state would determine their important issues and elect two representatives to go to a National Summit which is held once a year. (The 2018 Summit will be held in Baltimore, Maryland.) The assembled representatives would then determine among themselves who would form the four-person “Dream Team” that would become part of the 20-person delegation from the Diaspora to attend the session within the AU Summit. To us, the beauty of this approach is the fact that it begins at the grassroots level and takes our work up to the global level, giving our “on-the-ground” communities an opportunity to organize ourselves and influence our destinies in ways that we had been unable to in the past.
Over the years, the direction and commitment of the African Union have been challenged by wars, internal bureaucracy, political corruption and, more recently, crises like the Sierra Leone mudslides and the Ebola epidemic. Thus, the support we have seen from the AU has been inconsistent. But the model of organizing our communities, especially one like this that is based on organizing at the grassroots (community) level, is an important one, and one that we are committed to pushing forward. This effort is more important to the people of the African Diaspora than it is to any one global organization, and our plan can be used to link with the African Union, the United Nations, or an independent organization such as the recently-founded Pan African Federalist Movement. Our continued dedication to organizing as a people should enable us to push these organizations toward moving ahead with their respective plans to organize the African world, or to build the means for us to do it ourselves.
A critical part of this self-directed organizing effort is bringing together a wide variety of Pan-African organizations whose missions and emphasis may differ but whose work is ultimately devoted to a common goal: the uplift of the people of the African Diaspora. The historical enemies of African people have used a variety of means to continue our global oppression, from the poisoning of our earth to the stealing of our political rights to the outright killing of our people. If we are to answer this multi-pronged assault, we must do so in a multi-faceted, cooperative and strategic manner, together. This means our political, economic, spiritual, educational, cultural, revolutionary, media and many other types of organizations will need to learn how to work together in a cooperative manner.
It all begins at the local level; it all starts here. Because this is an organization that seeks to bring us together on the local level, local organization is needed for it to work. We ask you to become involved in the work to organize the African and African-descendant community with us. You do not have to leave any organization you currently belong to; you don’t even have to join ours. All we need is your attendance at our public meetings, your input to help us develop a Maryland Pan-Afrikan Agenda and elect representatives, and your regular involvement to provide us with grassroots leadership. Bring your organizations, bring your ideas, bring your individual philosophies, bring your friends, bring your thirst for knowledge and your curiosity, but most of all, bring your voice. This is one place where your voice will be heard and where it is needed. Come build with us!
Bro. Cliff, Maryland State Facilitator