Anchor Institutions and the Fate of Allah School in Mecca

 

   When the elders in our Nation of the Five Percent spoke and speak about the olden days, when our Parliaments were standing room only, how we had a working relationship with our local government, and when our influence in our communities spanned the boroughs, they are articulating how we were an Anchor Institution. Anchor Institutions are institutions, such as nonprofits, universities, hospitals, and corporations that serve as socioeconomic engines rooted in the communities they serve. According to National Academies, anchor institutions "play an important role in uplifting community conditions through a series of multilevel strategies and economic investment, including the creation of workforce training and living-wage jobs with good benefits, creating and improving affordable housing, increasing local safety and access to parks, and many others." Since its founding in 1967, our Allah School in Mecca Street Academy was established as our brick-and-mortar anchor for youth/community outreach within the Harlem community. Over the last fifty-seven years, we have fought to maintain that identity as an anchor in the public domain where mainstream media has historically mischaracterized us as a gang. With the expanding gentrification of Harlem, its subtle erasure, and redefinition as "North" or "Upper" Manhattan, it is important for us as Five Percenters to consider ways to protect our institution as the historical anchor it has been. 

     Within our Nation, it was always assumed among our members that our Allah School in Mecca is a parcel that was gifted to us by the Lindsay Administration with a 99-year lease. It was only recently discovered that no legal document exists to substantiate that claim of a 99-year lease. While some Five Percenters have argued that Allah School is Defacto ours because of our historical use, we are not the legal property owners. This parcel is classified as a miscellaneous religious facility owned by the New York City Department of Citywide Administrative Services [NYC DCAS]. From a legal standpoint, we as Five Percenters have been occupying this space based upon a non-verbal, undocumented memorandum of understanding with each City Administration since June of 1967. Because there is no legal documentation to substantiate our Defacto claim, our occupancy can be legally defined as squatting by the current or future City Administration. Luckily in New York, if squatters occupy a property continuously, openly, and exclusively without permission for a specified period, they can take its title. While this may be possible with a private owner, it is questionable if the New York City Department of Citywide Administrative Services would allow this to happen for prime commercial real estate that continues to appreciate in value over time.

     According to public records, the total assessed value of 2122 Adam Clayton Powell Jr Blvd [Allah School] in 2021 was $186,300. In 2022 it increased to $202,950. Its current value is $215,000. The value of the building [Youth Center], which measures 1,200 square feet, was $69,300 in 2021. In 2022 it increased to $85,950. The value of its land, which measures 12,490 square feet, has remained $117,000. Its market value, or the actual price someone was willing to pay for this property in 2021 was $414,000. Its current market value is $478,000 and continues to increase each year. Although there have been and continue to be conversations about the economic development of our Allah School, what has not increased are actual facade improvements or economic development on this property. 

     The value of any property is not based on the parcel itself. The property value is based on the surrounding neighborhood and the community. Sometimes to raise property value, community members are systematically excluded from economic development projects to redesign the neighborhood. This displacement process to change the character of an area for outsiders to move in is called gentrification. Regarding the Five Percent, this displacement of our Nation began during COVID-19. During the shutdown, we were restricted from using P.S. 154 Harriet Tubman Learning Center [250 W 127th Street] for our Universal Parliaments and Annual Show & Prove. Harriet Tubman was an adjacent Anchor Institution and community partner whom we have collaborated with for four decades. According to the School Administration Staff whom I spoke with at that time, the auditorium/cafeteria space was not available to the public due to COVID-19 gathering restrictions and unclear vaccination status protocols. This was understandable, seeing that most public spaces were closed during the shutdown. Yet four years later, our Five Percent Nation still has not set foot back in Harriet Tubman. This single maneuver displaced our most critical mass of Five Percenters who gathered monthly at Harriet Tubman for our Universal Parliaments and yearly for our Annual Show & Prove. Whether intentional or not, this maneuver undermined our ability to remain anchored in our community. As an alternative site, our Nation has been using P.S. 92 Mary McLeod Bethune [222 West 134 Street] for our Universal Parliaments and our upcoming Annual Show & Prove.

Allah School, PS 154 Harriet Tubman, PS 92 Mary McLeod Bethune

     Although this alternative site at P.S. 92 Mary McLeod Bethune is only half a mile away, it still displaces our Nation. Without our critical mass of Five Percenters gathering monthly and yearly within our community and at Harriet Tubman, a huge socioeconomic void was created that now erases our historic public visibility. How can we consistently engage our community members and provide resources where we are not present? How can we demonstrate that we are an asset rooted within our community, when we are not actually in the community? 

Aerial view of Allah School and its surrounding economic development

     When you look at the above aerial view of our Allah School, you can see the economic development and economic development potential around it. What you cannot see are the socioeconomic anchors that are being rooted around Allah School as engines to serve our community in ways in which our Allah School is not. While there are brothers who consistently show up in person/virtually once a week to talk for hours about our culture, there are no professional revenue-generating workshops, classes, or projects being facilitated at Allah School every day. We have no grant-funded youth advocacy/community outreach programs being offered in the neighborhood. We have no collaborative initiatives with area organizations and institutions that are available on-site or virtually. Nothing is being offered by/for women and girls; even though women represent 75% of the professional non-profit workforce in the U.S. and the Allah School is a non-profit. Additionally, according to a recent April 23rd Five Percenter Newspaper Facebook Group Post and my follow-up confirmation with School Officials, we are now in jeopardy of losing P.S. 92 Mary McLeod Bethune as the current location of our Universal Parliaments and the upcoming Show & Prove. A petition is being circulated by the surrounding school community to stop us from utilizing the space due to adult Five Percenters loitering, urinating, drinking alcohol, smoking marijuana, and being noisy on school property. 

April 23rd, 2024 Five Percenter Newspaper Facebook Post

     While some understandably see all of these things as a huge deficit, I see them as a unique opportunity for those of us who have the knowledge, wisdom, character, and consistency to make some positive productive workshops, classes, projects, programs, and initiatives happen. However, this will require some deep fundamental changes at our Allah School which some may not be willing to make. So where does this leave us? It leaves our Nation in an unprecedented time of growth and development if we are open to exploring solutions that may be beyond our personal scope. To continue our legacy as an Anchor Institution, we must be rooted in the same youth advocacy, community outreach, and capacity to secure resources as our founder, Allah. He was a doer, and his self-styled wisdom was evidenced in the way he actually shaped his community; the complete opposite of the deficits that I shared above. If we clearly do not have the character, experience, expertise, or credentials to lead these workshops, classes, projects, programs, and initiatives, we should proactively support the best knowers who do, regardless of our age or gender. Our survival literally depends upon this support, and our Nation will not thrive without it. 

Peace,

Saladin

Sands In The Hourglass

     There are a lot of ideas circulating calling themselves science. In reality they are merely conjecture, because they don't have enough substantial evidence to prove their veracity to principle elements, ideas and concepts to have us considered them true knowledge. 

Among these ideas or theories is the idea that [Supreme] Mathematics is our culture devoid of the history, legacy and acts of Allah and Justice. This is similar to saying that speaking English is English culture, when it is literally just the mouthpiece to express elements and phenomena within what is known as English culture. Language comes from the Latin, "lingua" meaning "tongue." Language is only one of culture's many elements: tradition, chronology or its history, education, science, beliefs and religion, art, literature, social conditions and ideology being some of its other elements.

What we call [Supreme] Mathematics is a spoken language which the Father Allah derived based upon his encounter with the Supreme Wisdom of Alphonzo, as taught to the Honorable Elijah Muhammad by Master Fard of the God tribes of the East. The language of Mathematics describes the concepts, nomenclature and ideology which falls under elements of the culture of Islam [I Self Lord And Master] That is, as a science, not to be confused with culture itself.

For within the culture of Islam there is beliefs, folklore, philosophy and religion and its diversity. With the religion of Islam, like various other religions, there are prejudices towards the beliefs of other religions. Within the science, as with the science of everything in life, one can ill-afford to let personal biases to stand in the way of the search which is the true basic premise of science--which is TO KNOW, and find the truth of things. We scientists welcome the study and analysis of everything, including the terms we use. Mathematics was derived by our Father observing the Supreme Wisdom book, concerning the Science of God or 360° of perfected Knowledge, which by the way was the masterstroke of knowing several languages.

NOMENCLATURE

Nomenclature is NAME, DESIGNATION: the act or process or an instance of naming; a system or set of terms or symbols especially in a particular science, discipline, or art like the nomenclature of inorganic chemistry or an international system of standardized New Latin names used in biology for kinds and groups of kinds of animals and plants. Naming describes and identifies meaning by isolating the principle reason of what a thing or quality exists for. Our language of speaking Mathematics should not be confused with a culture or curriculum of just using Supreme Mathematics solely. Most of us use terms belonging exclusively to Supreme Alphabets and the Twelve Jewels in our analysis of people, places, things and events to define their significance. When a person speaks, one's diction reflects the culture or discipline he or she comes from, it is not their culture solely. The words and terms it contains defines elements within their culture of the people who speak it and transformations that have occurred throughout their chronology. We use our language somewhat as a diagnostic tool; just as our founder [Allah] did when he studied Supreme Wisdom when he was in the Nation of Islam. The Father's choosing of One Hundred and Twenty Lessons [120°] as a primary part of our cultural curriculum is a result of that diagnostic decision-making which determined our destiny and legacy. When a person speaks Mathematics, they speak about ideas and imagery that exist within our cultural references of things which are principal to our specific culture. Its emphasis is on a science and philosophy which deals with the nature of our origin in this world, which is in essence is God; as told from an Eastern perspective.

As I said, Mathematics is a diagnostic tool which allows you articulate your findings within the linguistic aspects. The real culture is within the legacy of the original people which speak it. Without Supreme Alphabets, we would have no roles to fulfill, outside of the ones you read about in the lessons. Those who call this "the culture" do not subscribe to studying. This does not truly make sense since many of the words they use to describe reality does not exist in the Mathematical lexicon but exists as definitions only within 120° itself.

I remember, when I was young in this science many told me to "not to cast my 'pearls-among-swine' because they will only mix it in with their own disgusting mental foods," and now that I am psychically all-grown-up...I see this to be true. In this Western world of social media, like Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram, Twitter and etc, you do not have to conform or be socially accepted into esoteric or higher learning societies. You just have to hang around long enough to get the gist of things. You can forego the discipline it takes to conform to their peer group pressure, put together a social media page of stale ideas and build an audience of followers who idolize you with likes and love icons. What this does is adds more splinters to the splinters and weaken our ability to stand as a people, which is just what the enemy wanted. Love is a many splendored thing... but love of a people and it's destiny, is very hard to find.

Peace,

Life

Edited by 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