Person of Year

Anthony Ray Hinton was freed from jail after spending nearly 30 years on death row for a crime he did not commit. Upon his release, Anthony Ray Hinton, a 58 years old African-American, only said about the case: "All they had to do was to test the gun."

The US Supreme court ruled last year, after a second trial was opened, that Mr Hinton did not have adequate counsel during the first trial. During the

"Young folks with bedrolls and backpacks were milling about.  Veterans of the movement trained newcomers in the tactics of non-violence; the right way to protect yourself when attacked.  A doctor described what tear gas does to the body, while marchers scribbled down instructions for contacting their loved ones.  The air was thick with doubt, anticipation and fear.  And they comforted themselves with the final verse of the final hymn they sung:

No matter what may be the test, God will take care of you;
Lean, weary one, upon His breast, God will take care of you.”

It is with this powerfully poignant description of the mindset of those who mached 50 years ago in Selma, that US President Barack Obama opened his speech to commemorate the  50th Anniversary of the Selma to Montgomery Marches.

After four unclaimed awards in five years, Mo Ibrami Prize for Achievement in African Leadership prize for 2014 was awarded to the outgoing Namibian President Hifikepunye Pohamba. Mr Pohamba, a former independence movement freedom fighter who became president of Namibia for two terms, has won  the $5 millions award, for leading and leaving behind  "a well-governed, stable and inclusive democracy with strong media freedom and respect for human rights, " Salim Ahmed Salim, the chairman of the Mo Ibrahim Prize Committee and former Chair of  Organization of African Unity, now African Union,   said while awarding the prize.

Did you watch the new TV Show called "Empire"? If not, do. Please do! The runaway success of the  show about a family-run hip-hop music company has surprised the experts since it has started to air, four weeks ago.

“When I live down in the ghetto, every day I have to jump fence, police try and hold me, ya dig? Not for a week – for years! Years, till we have to get free now. It’s either you a bad, bad man and they shoot you down, or you make a move and show people improvement. It doesn’t have to be material, but in freedom of thinking," Bob Marley, the Rastafarian, iconic musician and freedom fighter told New York Professor Vivien Golman in 1979. Vivien Goldman, a former Public Relations for Bob Marley,  teaches a course called "Marley and Post-Colonial Music".

Tributes to civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. were held in the Unites States  nationwide, on Monday January 19, 2015. The day was marked by  massive march protests over the treatment of minorities by law enforcement. "This march is about reclaiming Martin Luther King. He was a radical organizer - he's been arrested, he believed in non-violence, but he was also disruptive," said  Linda Sarsour, spokeswoman for the Justice League NYC, which organized the #Dream4Justice March, a well attended tribute and protest march. 

On November 26, 2014, the United Nations (UN) Under Secretary General (SG) of Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), Baroness Valerie Amos, resigned from her position. Since then, several people outside and inside the UN have been seeking the position.

It is said that "better late than never". George Junius Stinney,Jr., a 14-year-old Black boy convicted and executed in South Carolina in 1944 for murders he did not commit was finally cleared in a new ruling by Judge Carmen Mullen. In her ruling, Judge Carmer Mullen said that the prosecution at the time failed on all accounts, denying the constitutional rights to the boy and rushing to condemn him without clear evidences. 

President Obama has convened a cabinet meeting on Monday December 1, 2014 to discuss the tough lessons learned from the ongoing unrest in Ferguson, Missouri. The meeting also included young people from civil rights and activist groups based in Ferguson , mayors,  and law enforcement officials from and across the country.

The topic was how to address the deteriorating relations  between the police and the communities they serve, and how to ensure that the divide is bridged. 

His name is Rasheen Aldridge.  Born and raised in St. Louis, Missouri, the 20 years old  Aldridge  is a natural leader.  After graduating from High School, he enrolled at Forest Park Community College, while working minimum wage jobs, the lot of many Black youth in underpriviledged areas, such as East Saint Louis or Ferguson, Missouri. But that did not stop him.

Marie Bamutese, AfroAmerica Network Black Woman of Year 2014,  is a survivor. As a schoolgirl, Marie Bamutese survived two of the worst tragedies the World has even known: