Muhammad Ali: Warrior, Activist and Spiritual Man!

By Abari Sankofa (aka Renarda A. Williams)

On Saturday morning, June 4, 2016, Muhammad Ali went to rest with the ancestors. He fulfilled his purpose for fostering the betterment of humanity.

He was a warrior whose extraordinary boxing skills will never ever be duplicated; an activist who challenged America's elitist governmental and capitalistic system — especially by his decision not to  fight in an unjust war in Vietnam; and a spiritual man ... a devoted Muslim who inspired and empowered people of different faiths all over the world.

It was during my junior and senior years in college that I got involved in Pan Africanism and Afrocentricity, and began to admire Ali, mainly because he was always proud to be BLACK! In particular, he supported the black print and electronic media press. I respected his commitment to empowering Black people in the diaspora and Africa, and other races of people around the world. He donated money to causes that dealt with the poor, homeless, and sick, especially those with incurable diseases, such as his own Parkinson's Disease.

I also respected the gentle and humble spirit of the man born Cassius Clay. I wished I had met him in person. I am sure Ali and I would have been the best of friends.

There are two things, among many others, Ali did that I will carry with me for the rest of my life: During one afternoon in the mid or latter 1980s, I saw Ali on a national news station running with several police officers in a major American city (I forget where) to a building on top of which was a man about to commit suicide. Ali was the one who talked the man down. 

Second, in 2004, I received a review copy of Ali's book, The Soul of a Butterfly: Reflections on Life's Journey (Simon and Schuster, 2004). Part of Ali's introduction has touched my spirit:

"My concept of religion has broadened over the years. My mother was a Baptist, and my father was a Methodist. They both believed that Jesus was the son of God. I don't believe that, but I believe he was an important prophet like Moses. I believe that on Judgement Day, my parents will be in heaven, not because they were without fault, but because they were decent, loving human beings, and they believed in God. We all have the same God, we just serve him differently. Rivers, lakes, ponds, streams, oceans, all have different names, but they all contain water. So do religions have different names, and they all contain truth, expressed in different ways, forms, and times. It doesn't matter whether you're a Muslim, Christian, or Jew. When you believe in God, you should believe that all people are part of one family. If you love God, you can't love only some of his children."

 On June 8, Roland Martin, host of TV One News One Now, talked with Ali's daughter, Maryum Ali, about a documentary on her father titled I am Ali. The documentary is an intimate and heartwarming look at Ali, the man behind the legend, that has never seen before. It was told through exclusive, unprecedented access to Ali's personal archive of 'audio journals' combined with touching interviews and testimonials from his inner circle of family and friends ... his daughters, son, brother and former wife, plus legends of the boxing community such as Mike Tyson, George Foreman, and Gene Kilroy. Maryum Ali told Martin that the documentary is one everybody should watch. She said the film shows her father's soul, heart, and spirit.

 Martin asked Maryum Ali whether it surprised her to see the kind of respect people have for Muhammad Ali today.  "No, it doesn't," she replied. "As children, we've seen [his greatness] for a long time. We know what he [has] accomplished. We are very blessed." 

Martin also mentioned the June 6 statement made by the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan about Muhammad Ali:

"The flesh of Muhammad Ali must return to the earth, but what he has done for the cause of Islam, for the cause of freedom, justice and equality will never die. These are the words that strike me, a life well lived and a job well done. He has finished his course. May Allah (God) grant him [the] Paradise that we believe he justly deserves."

Tavis Smiley, author, host and managing editor of Tavis Smiley on PBS and The Tavis Smiley Show from Public Radio International; and Earl Ofari Hutchinson, author, political analyst, and syndicated columnist, also commented on Ali.


In the June 5, 2016 CBS News Sunday Morning episode, "How Muhammad Ali helped Tavis Smiley Healed a Father-Son Rift," Smiley talked about the defining moment of his life that occurred was when he was just 12 years old.

  Muhammad Ali with Emory Garnell Smiley
Photo credit: Tavis Smiley

Smiley was falsely accused of a transgression by the minister at his church. According to Smiley's 2006 book What I Know for Sure: My Story of Growing Up in America, the accusations involved misbehavior during Sunday School ... "running wild, disobeying their teacher, disrespecting their teacher, disrespecting the sanctity of this building, and mocking the holy message being taught." In a momentary lapse of judgment, Smiley's stepfather, Emory Garnell Smiley, a deacon and a church trustee, believed the minister and beat Smiley so severely that it put him in the hospital.

"That incident essentially ruined my relationship with my dad during those all-important adolescent years, and we were basically estranged well into my adulthood. The great freedom fighter Frederick Douglass once said, 'It's easier to build strong children than it is to repair broken men,'" Smiley noted.

Smiley noted he was a broken man, struggling emotionally for years with how to repair the relationship with his father, whom he'd long since forgiven, but with whom he still didn't have a loving relationship.

Then enters Muhammad Ali.

"As a child, my fondest memories of the good times with my dad all revolved around watching those historic Ali fights on TV. My dad loved Ali — not just for his mastery of the sweet science in the ring, but for his courage to be a truth-teller.

"And I'd never seen a man so willing to speak the truth, no matter the consequences. And so, Ali, the freest Black man I'd ever seen, became my hero, too.

"I could never have imagined that I'd ever grow up to meet the champ, interview him many times, hang out with him, and eventually be honored to call him a friend and a brother. But sometimes your life exceeds your dreams," Smiley said.

Smiley mentioned he hosted an event in Ali's honor one night, and decided to surprise his dad by taking him as his guest. Smiley reserved a seat for his dad at the head table, right next to Ali.
 
"I guess you can imagine how this story ends. I've only seen my dad cry twice in his life: once when his father died, and the night he met Muhammad Ali.

"Ali was always the people's champ, but his lifetime of giving to others is what he'll be most treasured for. He felt that his love and service to everyday people was the rent he paid for the space he occupied.

"And as such, he always made you feel like you were the most important person in the room. He certainly made my dad feel that way, and every time I saw the champ from that night forward, I gave him a big hug and thanked him profusely for being the healing that helped to repair my relationship with my father," Smiley ended.

Smiley further noted that in a year where the world lost a number of legendary figures, it was especially going to miss The Greatest of All Time.

"We all owe Muhammad Ali a debt that we can never repay. I know I do," Smiley concluded.

Hutchinson stated in his June 4, 2016 column, The Hutchinson Report, that "The Greatest is gone." Hutchinson said when he heard of Ali's passing, his mind instantly raced back to 1968. He mentioned that Muhammad Ali by then had become America's biggest pariah. 

"His conversion to the Nation of Islam, his one-time friendship with Malcolm X, his outspoken black preachments, all capped by his refusal to be inducted [into the military] and his outspoken stance against the Vietnam War, made him a marked man. A federal grand jury in Houston quickly indicted him, and an all-white jury convicted him. He was slapped with the maximum punishment of five years in prison and a $10,000 fine. His passport was revoked. The FBI stepped up its effort to ruin him," Hutchinson said. 

He wrote of how one the FBI's many wiretaps on Martin Luther King Jr. in 1967 revealed that Ali had proposed to donate the proceeds from a boxing match to King's organization. But the match could not be held since every state boxing commission in the country had, by then, revoked Ali's license.

"Still, the FBI was alert for any hint that Ali might try to dodge legal restrictions on him to earn money in the ring. J. Edgar Hoover, the notorious head of the FBI at the time, assigned agents to watch and record everything that Ali said whenever he appeared on Johnny Carson's The Tonight Show. FBI agents also distributed 'anti-violent statements' to counter what the bureau called 'the anti-Vietnam stand of Cassius Clay.' The FBI's spy-and-intimidation operation against Ali was finally exposed in legal documents in his draft case in 1970," Hutchinson noted.

Hutchinson pointed out that by then, Ali, had embarked on the speaking circuit, talking to anti-war and student groups on various campuses. One of his stops was at California State University, Los Angeles, Hutchinson's alma mater. Ali arrived on campus followed by a small swarm of FBI agents. Wherever Ali went, FBI agents tracked his every move. Which didn’t matter to Ali; in fact, Hutchinson continued, it added to Ali's allure. 

"I, and a small entourage of Black Student Union members, met him in the parking lot to serve as his 'official' escorts to the auditorium. Ali was the paragon of cheer and graciousness, and was as always playful. He shook everyone’s hand and engaged in lighthearted banter with the students. In his talk, he stuck to his stock themes, leading a chant, 'No Vietcong ever called me a nigger,' punctuated by digs at the Johnson administration and his denunciation of racial oppression. During his speech, the FBI took notes and snapped pictures of those in the crowd," Hutchinson said.

What really brought the house down, Hutchinson recalled, was Ali's shout to the standing-room-only crowd that despite everything the government did to him, he still was the biggest, baddest and prettiest, and yes ... the greatest. "As he departed to loud cheers and shouts of encouragement, I, and a few others, thrust our draft cards in front of him, and he eagerly signed mine and the others. To this day. his signature on my draft card is one of my most precious and endearing keepsakes," Hutchinson ended.

In the next two decades, he said, the unthinkable happened, Hutchinson wrote. Ali was no longer America’s fallen and disgraced boxing champion. He was reborn, even exalted, as an American global ambassador of sport and even of political goodwill. In the immediate aftermath of the September 11 terrorist attacks, a Hollywood group loosely known as Hollywood 9/11 —  which worked with the Bush administration to support the war on terrorism  —  promoted happy images of American life to film audiences in Africa and the Middle East. And whom did they choose to be their star pitchman? "You guessed it, Ali," Hutchinson wrote.

"During the next decade, the honors continued to flow to him. Presidents, heads of state, and foreign dignitaries, all hailed him as an authentic American hero and icon. But Ali’s struggle with Parkinson’s Disease had clearly taken its toll. Yet the rare times he appeared in public, I noted that he still had that same ingratiating smile he greeted me with those years earlier. And he would snap out an occasional playful jab to swooning and adoring admirers.  Despite everything, Ali was and would always be mine and the world’s 'peoples champ' and yes, the greatest," Hutchinson ended.

Hutchinson also submitted the following statement and photos in The Hutchinson Report: "This is the Muhammad Ali the World Must Also Remember!"