Tottenham 1985-2011: Through the Fire
by Guest Contributor Nichole Black, originally published at On Race and Resistance
On Saturday evening 6th of August I was gathered with friends in Peckham, South London celebrating the opportunities and doors open to us. One friend travelling to China for a year, my scholarship for a masters degree, another friend rising in influence in the community. All of us young Black people having grown up in the inner city on Estates and council properties. Graduates with narratives that disturb the monolithic perspective of Black youth identity. But not disconnected from our own context and committed to our community it was with grief, sympathy and solidarity that we turned toward Tottenham, by then, ablaze with anger and burning out brick and mortar. This morning – through the soot and smoke filter – the socio-economic barriers remained.
Numerous stories have emerged but there is no verified account of what turned a peaceful protest into a riot that would endanger lives and ruin local businesses and services. Earlier that afternoon members of the community in Tottenham gathered to demand answers from the metropolitan police, who on Thursday 4th August stopped 29 year old Mark Duggan in a Mini Cab and engaged in a shoot out that resulted in his death. Duggan, father of four, had allegedly been in possession of firearms. This is another of at least three accounts of Black men’s deaths during police operations this year alone. It has only been five months since over a thousand people gathered to protest the suspicious death of Smiley Culture whilst the police were at his home.
Last night’s riots in Tottenham come exactly twenty-five years after the infamous Broadwater Farm riots in the same part of London. Not vastly dissimilar from recent events, Cynthia Jarret died whilst the police conducted a search of her home. Just the week before that Dorothy Groce was shot by police instigating the 1985 Brixton Uprisings. When community members gathered at the police station tensions rose and the peaceful protest in Tottenham erupted into riot. The violence escalated and policeman Keith Blakelock was killed. (The intricacies of this case are harrowing and worth reading).
If we are shocked at what is going on in Tottenham we have failed to trace history & the relationship between authorities & poor & BME. – @HanaRiaz
A quarter of a century on we are asking if police-community relations in Tottenham are any better. That is only for the residents of that area to say but it is evident that they are still not good enough when police accounts are understandably met with such distrust. As we face-off with the returned ugliness of the 80s British conservatism and increasing hostility, conditions are being set for a ‘police army state’. I was disgusted listening to a BBC Radio 5 reporter commenting ‘If you shoot at the police what else do you expect?’ I expect the police to arrest and charge their suspects. I expect individuals charged with crimes to face court and the full length of our judicial process as required. (The Guardian has since published information stating early ballistic tests show that all bullets were fired from the police – evidence of the false account used to cover police corruption.) I have not been so deceived out of my citizenship, nor convinced of the absent humanity of those of us living in the inner city, as to expect and humbly accept rising numbers of curious deaths at the hands of our police – and certainly not when they are all men of African-Caribbean descent. As Reverend Nims passionately expressed standing in Tottenham speaking to BBC News this afternoon, the Duggan family waited for hours to get answers from the police to no avail. Their anger is legitimate and their right to justice persists.
The police said Mark Duggan had a gun, Smiley had a knife, Jean Charles de Menenzes had a bomb and Ian Tomlinson died of natural causes. – @Melissamono
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