The Pan-African flag also referred to as the UNIA flag, Afro-American flag or Black Liberation Flag. It is a tri-color flag consisting of three equal horizontal bands colored Red, Black, and Green. The Universal Negro Improvement Association and African Communities League (UNIA) formally adopted it on August 13, 1920, in Article 39 of the Declaration of Rights of the Negro Peoples of the World. During its month-long convention held at Madison Square Garden in New York City, United States. Variations of the flag can and have been used in various countries and territories in Africa and the Americas to represent Pan-Africanist ideology. Various Pan-African organizations and movements also often employ the flag's colors for their activities.
Colors and Significance
Three Pan-African colors on the flag represent:
Red: the blood that unites all people of Black African ancestry, and shed for liberation.
Black: black people whose existence as a nation, though not a nation-state, is affirmed by the existence of the flag.
Green: the abundant natural wealth of Africa.History
The flag was created in 1920 by the members of the UNIA in response to the enormously popular 1900 coon song "Every Race Has a Flag but the Coon," which has been cited as one of the three coon songs that "firmly established the term coon in the American vocabulary". A 1921 report appearing in the Africa Times and Orient Review, for which Marcus Garvey previously worked, quoted him regarding the importance of the flag: Show me the race or the nation without a flag, and I will show you a race of people without any pride. Aye! In song and mimicry, they have said, "Every race has a flag but the coon." How true! Aye! But that was said of us four years ago. They can't say it now...
Pledge to the Red, Black, & Green
I commit my Body, Mind, and Spirit to the protection, defense, and security of the RED, BLACK, and GREEN I Dedicate my Life to the Redemption of Mother Africa And the Liberation of her scattered Black Children.
I Accept for myself and my descendants the teachings of Universal African Nationalism And Promise that our children will be instilled with the purpose and knowledge of themselves as African people in order that the cause of our struggle will neither falter nor fail until all Black People are Free and United, through