August 30, 2012 show: Monira Kayhan on Hijab and racial profiling

On August 30, 2012, CHUO 89.1 FM The Train's Denis Rancourt interviewed Ms. Monira Kayhan live in studio, on the meaning of Hijab, on her activism and education to police about Islam, and on her experiences with racial profiling in Ottawa.

April 12, 2012 show: Mireille Gervais interviews Monira Kayhan on racial profiling in middle class Ottawa

On April 12, 2012, CHUO 89.1 FM (Ottawa) The Train's Mireille Gervais interviewed Ottawa resident Monira Kayhan about personal experiences with racial profiling by police and others in middle class life in Canada's capital.

Readings and thoughts about Malcolm X

On January 26, 2012, CHUO 89.1 FM (Ottawa) The Train's Denis Rancourt "interviewed" Malcolm X via the man's autobiography, and other topics in an hour of solo radio.

Malcolm X early on developed two explicit commitments that largely defined his public life:

(1) While in jail he decided to commit himself to telling the white man to the white man's face what the white man is really like.

(2) Out of jail while recruiting for the temple he started telling his black brothers that for too long the black man was paralyzed by fear of the white man and to urge them to find the greater dignity and humanity to defend themselves.

Dr. Ajamu Nangwaya on race analysis in union and power politics

On November 24, 2011, CHUO 89.1 FM (Ottawa) The Train's Denis Rancourt interviewed social scientist Dr. Ajamu Nangwaya about his work analyzing racism in union organizations and race attitudes within the class structures in North America.

The discussion included a critique of the Occupy Wall Street movement, the welfare state as an accommodation to capitalism, the radical way to labour self-management, white supremacy as a barrier to progressive aims, resistance cooptation impact on race solidarity, the need for free expression in the public arena -- even racist or homophobic speech, criminal gangs versus Black Panthers in establishment's response, Obama's racism, and more.

Dr. Benoit Awazi on the African Crisis

On November 3, 2011, CHUO 89.1 FM (Ottawa) The Train's Denis Rancourt interviewed Dr. Benoit Awazi, President of the "Centre for Multidisciplinary Research on Black African Communities and Diaspora" (translated from French) about the re-emergent colonialism in Africa, the Africa Crisis, Muammar Caddafi's murder, elite intellectual dishonesty, the recent Ivory Cost war crime of France, the collapse of intelligence, the intimidation of Greece, and much more.

Dr. Awazi is the author of several critical books about the Africa Crisis. We contrasted Dr. Awazi's criticisms with the criminal sham that is the "R2P" doctrine shamelessly promoted by U of O president Allan Rock, among others. History will expose these false-justifications for global colonialist interventionism.

Hazel Gashoka on Ottawa police brutality and racism in U of O student politics

On October 20, 2011, CHUO 89.1 FM (Ottawa) The Train's Denis Rancourt interviewed student activist, 4th-year psychology major and U of O Senate member Hazel Gashoka, live in-studio.

Unfortunately, the sound track was lost due to technical problems.

Ms. Gashoka described her 2003 violent and racist encounter with the Ottawa Police, from her first days as a 1st-year student on the U of O campus. Ms. Gashoka reported that she was pushed to the ground for no apparent reason by one of Ottawa's finest. When she protested, she was hauled off in cuffs into a dark holding truck, told to urinate on herself, and then dumped into a cold holding cell on a steel plate to spend the night, without ever being charged. Her recommended music for the theme was "Fuck the Police" by N.W.A.

Ms. Gashoka went on to describe:

• the inherent racism of the white U of O student union (SFUO) in its paternalistic management of Black History Month campus organizing,
• the SFUO's absurd stance in eliminating the Student Arbitration Committee - its constitutional independent judiciary arm - under the pretext of increasing "democratic representation", and
• the zoo that is the Senate of the University of Ottawa, chaired by president Allan Rock.

We apologize for not being able to provide this sound track for this interview.

Racism and John Akpata on Ottawa police misbehaviour

On August 4, 2011, CHUO 89.1 FM (Ottawa) The Train's Denis Rancourt read an introductory essay about the theory and practice of racism in society before interviewing spoken word artist and politician (Marijuana Party of Canada) John Akpata on the topic of police misbehaviour in Ottawa, Canada's capital.

John explained how citizens can participate to make police accountable. He also described his recent conflict with police (reported by the national media) over his constitutional right to not let a cop take his cell phone using the sole pretext that it contains witness evidence.


John mentioned these two key resources:

OIPRD - Office of the Independent Police Review Director
Police Services Act - Ontario

Hassan Diab wanted by France: Insane extradition proceedings, Ottawa, Canada

On January 20, 2011, The Train interviewed Peter Gose (in studio) and Donald Pratt (by phone, US), two members of the support network for Hassan Diab.

Find out how and why Diab has been targeted despite his obvious innocence. Find out how evidence that proves his innocence is withheld and just how bad the so-called evidence is... Truly nightmarish. And of course the capital's two main universities played their part.

Justice for Hassan Diab website

War, Support our Troops, Campus Democracy, Racism and Student Oppression!

This week's show begins with undergraduate students Jeremy Robbins and Dylan Gowans joining us in studio to share their opinions of the Red Fridays Campaign voted down at a recent SFUO Campaigns Committee meeting. Dylan and Jeremy had expressed their views in a Fulcrum issue where they criticized those who pretend that support for our troops can be an apolitical act...

During the second half of the show co-host Mireille Gervais conversed with her colleague Zachary Fouchard about their experience working as Student Appeal Officers with the Student Appeal Centre. The SAC's advice concerning unfair grades was recently featured in Maclean's university rankings issue. Racism, asymmetry of power between students and administrators and how to deal with doing emotionally charged work and many other themes were discussed.

El-Farouk Khahi

This week activist, lawyer and politician El-Farouk Khaki joined us by phone from Toronto.

A self-proclaimed feminist, Khahi focuses his work on queer rights issues within Islam and works as a lawyer in the filed of human rights and immigration law.

Ehab Lotayef - Poet, Photographer and Activist

Listen to this unique Five O'Clock Train interview with poet and activist Ehab Lotayef - North American aboriginal rights, Palestine, solidarity, Quebec racism, culture cures, human rights, laws and colonialism...

Ehab ended the show by sharing this poem with our listeners:

To Kill a Suicide Bomber

When should you kill the suicide bomber?

Just do it fast before she dies.

Why would you kill the suicide bomber?

You kill the rage, the girl survives.

Where would you kill the suicide bomber?

Anywhere where there are no chains.

But how would you kill the suicide bomber?

Give her justice, she will defuse.

Critical look at Mahatma Gandhi

The September 3, 2009, Five O'Clock train was a lively phone interview with co-author G.B. Singh of the new book "Gandhi under cross-examination", speaking from his university office in Nashville, TN.

Gandhi's life presents many contradictions and much evidence suggests an ingrained racism/classism. He recruited co-citizens in South Africa to fight in a colonial war against blacks. His later pacifism was not for cowards; since he stated that it was better to die trying to aquire arms to fight than to use pacifism as an excuse for cowardice.

Singh's book points us to this key quote from Gandhi that has much relevance in Canada's present colonial war in Afghanistan:

“I make no distinction, from the point of view of ahimsa, between combatants and non-combatants. He who volunteers to serve a band of dacoits [robbers], by working as their carrier, or their watchman while they are about their business, or their nurse when they are wounded, is as much guilty of dacoity [robbery] as the dacoits themselves. In the same way those who confine themselves to attending to the wounded in battle cannot be absolved from the guilt of war.”

Make no mistake, Canadians are the robbers here... Strong words from the most famous pacifist.