Assata Shakur - Our African Warrior Queen

July 16, 1947 - September 25, 2025

Assata Shakur (born JoAnne Deborah Byron, later JoAnne Chesimard) was a Black Revolutionary, activist, and former member of the Black Panther Party (BPP) and the Black Liberation Army (BLA).

She was born in New York City. As did many Africans in amerikkka, Assata experienced social-political-economic oppression and police harassment. This influenced her involvement in Revolutionary activism. 

Assata joined the BPP in the late 1960’s. She worked on several Community Survival Programs sponsored by the Party which included the Free Breakfast For Children Program and the Community Health Clinic Program. After the Panthers came under heavy FBI surveillance and repression through COINTELPRO, she joined the underground BLA, which engaged in armed resistance.

During this period in her life, Assata was involved in an incident on the New Jersey Turnpike. On May 2, 1973, a car carrying Assata and other BLA members was pulled over on the New Jersey Turnpike by Pigs James Harper and Werner Foerster. A shootout ensued, during which Pig Foerster and BLA member Zayd Malik Shakur were killed. Assata was arrested for the murder of the Pig. During her trial, Assata’s defense attorney argued that before the shooting occurred, she had her arms raised to surrender but was shot twice making it impossible for her to have fired a weapon. However, she was later convicted of murder, though Assata and her supporters long maintained that she was wrongfully convicted because of her Revolutionary politics.

Assata spent several years in prison under inhumane conditions and often in solitary confinement. In 1979, she escaped from the Clinton Correctional Facility for Women in New Jersey with the help of allies from the BLA.

The FBI labeled Assata a “domestic terrorist” and placed her on the Most Wanted Terrorists List (the first woman ever to be added). There was a $2 million reward for her capture.

By 1984, she had been granted political asylum in Cuba by Fidel Castro and the socialist Cuban Revolution, where she lived as a free African woman up until the time of her recent transition to 'Ancestor'. 

To many Africans in amerikkka, especially her comrades within Black Revolutionary and Liberation movements, Assata Skakur is viewed as a Revolutionary Freedom Fighter and Political Prisoner in exile. Her autobiography, Assata: An Autobiography (1987), is widely read and continues to inspire activists today. 

Queen Assata Shakur left behind an impactful legacy and many inspiring life lessons via her writings. I would like to share several of these life lessons with you below.

“The usual way that people are taught to think in amerika is that each subject is in a little compartment and has no relation to any other subject. For the most part, we receive fragments of unrelated knowledge, and our education follows no logical format or pattern. It is exactly this kind of education that produces people who don’t have the ability to think for themselves and who are easily manipulated.”

“The schools we go to are reflections of the society that created them. Nobody is going to give you the education you need to overthrow them. Nobody is going to teach you your true history, teach you your true heroes, if they know that that knowledge will help set you free.”

“It is our duty to fight for our freedom. It is our duty to win. We must love each other and support each other. We have nothing to lose but our chains.”

“I advocate revolutionary changes...an end to capitalist exploitation, the abolition of racist policies, the eradication of sexism and the elimination of political repression. If that is a crime, then I am totally guilty.”

“I believe in living. I believe in birth. I believe in the sweat of love and in the fire of truth. And I believe that a lost ship, steered by tired, seasick sailors, can still be guided home to port.”

Queen Assata has been guided home to live with God and the 'Ancestors'.

Marinate on that!

Ready For Revolution 

All Power To The People!!!