Setting The Record Strait: Allah & Justice, Five Percenters Square!!

"Clarence 13X was the level of understanding he [Allah, The Father] had when he was in the mosque. As his understanding grew he took on the name Allah. We honor Allah as the man who founded the Five Percenters, not Clarence 13X who was a Muslim at that time." 

Mal'akiy 17 Allah 

[Responding to a Community Board Member who asked, "Why not name it Clarence 13X Way?"]

On Saturday March 30th the Official Street Naming of 126th Street and Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Boulevard to Allah & Justice, Five Percenters Square set the record in commemorating our community. Through the vision of our brother Mal'akiy 17 Allah [K.O.S. 5 Allah], support of our community members and local government, this permanent landmark was established to honor our cultural heritage, preserve and perpetuate our legacy. 

Traditionally, the naming of streets were done for a practical purpose. That purpose has been to create a sense of spatial orientation in order to minimize confusion where people travel, to give them a clear sense of direction and to help them easily navigate an environment. A street named Oakwood Street was typically in an area where there were oak woods. River Road is a road by a river. Clearmount Drive is often a road you drive on that gives you a clear view of the local mountain. Commemorative street names of people or historic events move beyond just a practical purpose. Here are just 7 things to understand about commemorative street names and their potential power in transforming communities:

• Commemorative street names of people and historic events are landmarks that establish a sense of permanence and public visibility that is acknowledged, legitimized and celebrated by a municipality [locally] and reinforced regionally, nationally and globally. 
• The renaming of a street changes maps, tourist guide books, GPS coordinates, spatial orientation, residential and/or commercial addresses, geography and social landscapes. It is a reorientation of public space and the people in it.
• Commemorative street names of people and historic events highlight an official narrative that is attached to that landmark. That official narrative establishes "identity politics" that are also attached to a municipality [locally] and reinforced regionally, nationally and globally. It is the location where asphalt meets identity, giving concrete meaning to the culture, chronology and social context of the people this landmark represents.
• The official narrative representing a person, people or historic event can rise or fall in the eyes of the public, based upon who creates, controls and communicates that content. That official narrative publicly highlights the character, reputation and legacy of the person or people [community] who are associated with that landmark. 
• Commemorative street names of people and historic events can build civic pride and change the power dynamics [geopolitics and socioeconomics] of a community. 
• Commemorative street names of people and historic events create cultural [heritage] tourism and other economic opportunities for its community members, AND potential.. outsiders... 
• Commemorative street names of people and historic events serve as a cultural barometer; an indicator that forecasts the potential conditions and elevation of a community and the politics surrounding its collective identity. That collective identity is its cultural capital.

These are just some of the things I have considered and what some of our Universal Family discussed during the Community Engagement class I facilitated at the Allah School In Mecca CommonUnity Center following the Official Unveiling of our street sign. As one of the representatives of our glorious Nation I give all that I have and do all within my power to see that we manifest our power locally, regionally, nationally and globally. The significance of our street being a 'square' puts anyone on square who claims to be about this culture.

Mal'akiy 17 Allah who spearheaded this Landmark initiative

This landmark commemoration of Allah & Justice, Five Percenters Square is equally a "decommemoration" of those people, places and things that are not us. With this symbolic event we publicly honor, observe and recognize who we are and put to rest any confusion about who we are not. Some of that confusion is the result of misinformation or poor guidance. Some of that confusion has been deliberate propaganda people have used to try and hijack or change our official narrative. People have incorrectly and disrespectfully called Allah, our founder, by his registered Muslim name Clarence 13X, even though he was not a Muslim or a registered member of the NOI [Nation of Islam] when he founded the Five Percent Nation. During one of the Community Board Presentations for the street naming Mal'akiy 17 Allah was asked by a Community Board Member, "Why not name it Clarence 13X Way?" to which he responded, "Clarence 13X was the level of understanding he [Allah, The Father] had when he was in the mosque. As his understanding grew he took on the name Allah. We honor Allah as the man who founded the Five Percenters, not Clarence 13X who was a Muslim at that time." 

Shamel Allah [Allah's Grandsun] and Law Student Starmel Allah with Allah's Military Medals

Over the years, outside onlookers and Five Percenter defectors have incorrectly called us a religion, Muslims, a NOI splinter group, Muslim Gods, a Gang and a variety of other false narratives that fundamentally contradict who Allah & Justice was and what a Five Percenter's square represents. March 30th, 2019 is another major victory in putting that confusion to rest. It is another positive step in the right direction of protecting our cultural identity, preserving and perpetuating our legacy as a unique group or people with our own language, social norms and worldview. This also emplaces [positions] our members in a public space of local, regional, national and global visibility that some of us may have never thought about and professionally prepared for. Because of this, some of us must begin reconsidering how we represent ourselves as citizens of our Nation and what we can do to add-on to the cipher. I am one of many who have anticipated this day and today we set the record strait! 

Peace,

Saladin

Arkansas Dept. of Corrections Sued By Muslims To Recognize Difference Between Five Percenters

According to a public statement issued by CAIR [Council on American-Islamic Relations], a grassroots civil rights and advocacy group:

(WASHINGTON, D.C., 3/1/2019) -- The Council on American-Islamic Relations, the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, today announced the filing of a lawsuit challenging the Arkansas Department of Correction’s (ADC) forced combination of religious services for Islam, the Nation of Islam, and the Nation of Gods and Earths. 

[NOTE: Nation of Gods and Earths is sometimes referred to as Five-Percent Nation or the Five Percenters.]

The CAIR Legal Defense Fund, joined by Professor Douglas Laycock of the University of Texas at Austin, filed the lawsuit on behalf of Gregory Houston Holt a/k/a Abdul Maalik Muhammad. 

Holt, joined in the suit by Muslim inmates Rodney Martin and Wayde Stewart, believes that attending Friday prayer services alongside and led by other adherents of Islam is a spiritual requirement. The current ADC policy, which forces adherents of Islam, the Nation of Islam, and Nation of Gods and Earths to attend a combined religious service, does not meet that requirement because the three groups represent different religious groups with distinct beliefs and practices.

The suit alleges that Arkansas’s combined services policy violates the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act.

Under ADC policy, Muslims risk losing their designation as Muslim if they skip or refuse to attend the combined Friday prayer services. Losing that designation in turn threatens the loss of their other religious accommodations, including meals during Ramadan.

LINK TO LAWSUIT

“Religious freedom protects everyone’s ability to worship with those who share their faith,” said CAIR National Litigation Director Lena Masri. “Followers of Islam, Nation of Islam and the Nation of Gods and Earths should be permitted to worship separately in a manner of their choice, just as Arkansas currently offers such accommodations for Catholic, Baptist, Jewish, and Buddhist worship services.”

She noted that Holt previously prevailed 9-0 before the U.S. Supreme Court in a case which required Arkansas to permit Holt to grow a beard, in accordance with his sincerely-held Islamic beliefs.

“Mr. Muhammad won the right to practice his Muslim faith in Arkansas prisons four years ago, and should win again here,” said Professor Douglas Laycock, who argued Holt’s earlier case before the U.S. Supreme Court.  “The Arkansas Department of Correction needs to join the Federal Bureau of Prisons and several large state prison systems in recognizing that Islam and the Nation of Islam are completely different faith traditions.” The suit also asks for the Nation of Gods and Earths to be recognized as a separate faith.

“It is unacceptable that Arkansas thinks it may define who is a Muslim based on whether or not they attend Friday services, all while refusing to provide spiritually-valid Friday services,” said CAIR National Trial Attorney Carolyn Homer. “No one checks how often Christians in the facilities attend Sunday services before letting them celebrate Christmas.”

This case is the latest in a series of lawsuits CAIR has brought to defend the rights of inmates to practice their faith inside jails and prisons across the country.  Last, year, CAIR filed lawsuits on behalf of Muslim inmates in Alaska and Washington state. 

CONCLUSION

According to this CAIR lawsuit against the Arkansas Department of Correction’s (ADC):

• "ADOC is forcing Plaintiffs and other Muslims to hold a combined religious service (in addition to religious study groups and other religious programming) with other religious faith groups – namely, Nation of Islam (“NOI”) and Five-Percent Nation/Nation of Gods and Earths (“NGE”)." 
• "All three Plaintiffs sincerely believe that attending a religious service led by a different faith group is a violation of their core religious principles."
• "The Defendants’ deliberate indifference and failure to respect the religious differences between Islam, Nation of Islam (“NOI”), and the Nation of Gods and Earths (“NGE”) has forced Plaintiffs and other Muslim inmates similarly situated to violate their core religious beliefs. Instead, ADOC has unlawfully forced Plaintiffs and other Muslim inmates to choose between attending a combined religious service led by adherents of NOI and/or NGE, or not attending any religious services at all, although the Blue consent decree explicitly requires ADOC to provide separate religious services for these separate religious faith groups. Neither attending services led by another faith nor skipping services fulfills Plaintiffs’ religious obligations. The act of attending a religious service led by a different faith tradition is a violation of each Plaintiff’s core religious 14 principles." 
• "ADOC’s deliberate and willful failure to recognize the religious differences between Islam, NOI, and NGE has caused significant tension and discord among inmate populations that adhere to Islam, NOI, and NGE across ADOC’s facilities. 

In addition to the lawsuit asking for the Five Percenters [Nation of Gods and Earths] to be recognized as separate from [Orthodox] Islam and the NOI, it was noted that requiring Muslims to attend religious services led by adherents of the NOI or NGE is akin to requiring Christians to attend religious services led by a Jewish rabbi, or Jews to attend religious services led by a Christian priest. Although some of the definitive language describing who we [the Five Percent] are as a culture is lacking within this lawsuit, the legal move to distinguish our Nation from religious bodies such as Orthodox Islam and the various Nation's of Islam is a positive step in the right direction of continuing the preservation of our distinct cultural identity, integrity and autonomy as Allah's Five Percent. 

Peace,

Saladin