Struggle-La Lucha: “Mumia says it’s about love. What else could have given 17 people the passion to hike 103 miles for 12 days across Pennsylvania, from Philadelphia to the Mahanoy prison in Frackville? They arrived on Dec. 9, marking 44 years since December 1981, when Black Panther journalist Mumia Abu-Jamal was framed for the murder of Philadelphia police officer Daniel Faulkner.

The warmth in their hearts gave the Marchers4Mumia the stamina to endure a bone-chilling, bitter cold wave with the added danger of marching through Trump country. Bob Nash, an elder with Veterans for Peace, who is 82 years young, marched the entire route along with others, some nearly a quarter of his age.

Why else would they have chosen this holiday season when every TV and newspaper is blasting a daily distraction of “Black Friday” gift sales? A Black woman on the march noted that the hardship endured on the march was nothing compared to the brutal conditions that break down the health of prisoners. Mumia has been denied proper medical care in prison, permanently risking his eyesight.

Of course, the marchers were motivated by hatred too, of a racist system that has locked Mumia Abu-Jamal in a ‘steel box’ ever since he was shot in the abdomen by police after stopping the taxi he was driving to help his brother in the street. The march has been fueled by Mumia’s prolific reports written from inside the walls about the privatized U.S. prison system that incarcerates a wildly disproportionate number of African Americans.”

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