People's Power Lab

  By Wilermine Mwakamupya (Student at Sanderson High School in Raleigh, NC) My name is Wilermine Mwakamupya, and I’m 16 years old. I go to Sanderson High School, and I’m a junior. I live with my parents and seven siblings, so there are nine people in our house. We arrived in the United States in January 2019, leaving behind our home country of Burundi, a small nation in East Africa. Before coming here, we lived in a refugee camp for 10 years, which was very difficult. My parents, Mwakamupya Shisho and Beatrice, always wanted us to get an education and have a better life, as life in Burundi was very challenging. Many people in our country struggled to find enough food and a safe place to sleep, and refugees in the camp faced even more challenges. Immigrant groups brought food to the camp every month, but the amount was not enough for many families because most had many children, so the food would run out quickly. My dad worked as a carpenter when we were in Burundi, and my mom had a...

People's Power Lab has a mission to build the power of Black, Brown, and Muslim working-class community members in our base. We represent many Rohingya, Afghan, Syrian, Somali, Congolese and and other refugees in the Triangle area of North Carolina. In addition, we represent many working class African Americans in the Triangle and Rocky Mount. Our organizing mission includes education justice for the most impacted community members within our base. A significant number of working-class refugees/immigrants and African American community members in our base are denied the basic education resources. Education system in North Carolina and the USA has historically under-served Black, Brown, and working-class community members. A significant number of immigrants and refugees with young children live in poverty. In fact, approximately half of parents with children between the ages of 0-10 live in poverty (source: Migration Policy Institute. April 2021 ). Poverty and lack of English fluenc...

My name is Afsa Kevine Kimbi. Here is the story of my life. My story before I moved to the USA I was born in a small city called Bujumbura. It is located in Burundi, East Africa. I lived in a refugee camp called Kavumu with my whole family: my mother, father, my big brother, three sisters, and one little brother who passed away when he was 3 years old. Living in a refugee camp was very horrible because how we had to exchange food just to buy a different food . There is a group of people called UNHCR who help everybody by giving food away like beans, rice, oil, and soybeans. Coming here was very difficult because I had to take a lot of shots and take a lot of medicine and my parents had to sign a lot of papers.  They would send this big bus called OIM-IOM to take refugees from the camp to the city. From there they asked us questions to decide which state to send us to. My father has one brother and one sister in Congo; and two brothers and one sister in Burundi. And in my mother’s f...

Organizing Against Shaw Rezoning and Defending King Khalid Masjid The following letter-to-the-editor was published in the News and Observer on June 25, 2023. The Raleigh City Council’s decision to rezone Shaw Unive rsity’s properties was a massive disappointment for Black, Brown, Muslim, and working-class community members. Opposition to rezoning brought together a diverse coalition, ranging from Shaw students and alums who want to maintain the historic character of their campus, Muslim community members who want to save a mosque on the campus, and Raleigh community members who are opposed to gentrification in downtown Raleigh neighborhoods. Opponents of rezoning organized multiple protests against it and expressed their opposition to it during city council meetings. After the divided vote favoring the rezoning, coalition members will redouble grassroots organizing against policies and elected officials who value development over people. Protest in defense of King Khalid Masjid in Rale...

The Story of My Life by Arafat Islam*   We are Rohingya refugees who have risked a lot of things to be where we are now. It’s all thanks to God that we have come this far and are in a safe place now. In our country (Myanmar), there are a lot of things going on. We could barely be outside or even go anywhere without feeling scared and afraid. Most of our villages get burned down by the military when they see us; they do not recognize us as people. Instead, they probably think we are some kind of people that do not belong in this world, but we are all still human beings, just like everyone else. Many of our people get killed whenever they lay their eyes on us or spot us. We could barely be anywhere because they made us fear what they would do to us if they found us. We went through so much trouble to escape because if we got caught, it would be all over for us. So many days went by, and after so much traveling, we finally made it out safely to Malaysia. In around 2007, my dad went t...

Welcome to the Blog of People's Power Lab. The People’s Power Lab is a Triangle, North Carolina-based organization with a mission to build the power of Black, Brown, and Muslim working-class youth and adults through political education, media justice, and recruiting them to the broader progressive movement. Goals - Build consciousness of our crises and solution to our crises through political education. - Develop grassroots media strategies to amplify our message. - Organize our people to take actions against crises faced by them. - Recruit community members to the broader social justice movement with an intersectional lens. PPL organizes working-class African American; South Asian/Middle Eastern immigrants, and refugees in the Triangle area of North Carolina, and Rocky Mount, NC. Many of refugee members in our base include Rohingya, Afghan, Syrian, Somali, Congolese, Rwandan, and other refugees. Some of the crises we organize for include healthcare/mental health justice, worker...