Special to the AmNews
People paid their respects on Saturday, June 15, as they packed Harlem’s Chamber’s Baptist Church (219 E. 123rd St.) to bid farewell to brother Dumar Wa’de Allah, who became an ancestor after succumbing to a heart attack five days earlier. Many reflected on his thirst for acquiring information, his swift wordplay, his work with urban youths, as well as his lifelong committed community efforts and love for his immediate family.
Dumar was physically manifested on Feb. 17, 1949, in Winter Haven, Fla., to Ulysses and Alice Bernice Wade. After his family migrated to New York City in 1958, he and his sister, Queen Cipher, attended public school prior to meeting Allah the Father in 1966 and embracing “knowledge of self,” as taught by the Five Percenters, aka Nation of Gods and Earths (NGE).
Directed by Allah to attend Harlem Prep and further his education, Dumar became one of the first Five Percenters to graduate from the high school and go to college through the arrangement Allah made with the high school’s headmaster, Ed Carpenter. While enrolled there, he came under the tutelage of renowned African scholar warrior Dr. Yosef ben-Jochannan.
“Because we had knowledge of self, we used to challenge Dr. Ben, and we used to build,” Dumar recently recalled. “Dr. Ben liked our enthusiasm as young people and was attracted to us due to [the fact] that we were fiery and enthusiastic about learning more knowledge of ourselves. Before we graduated, we introduced Dr. Ben to the Father.”
Dumar consistently accompanied Allah on visits to correctional facilities as they attempted to reach the incorrigible youths who had gotten tangled in the web of the system. Upon his graduation from Harlem Prep in 1968, Dumar attended the University of Massachusetts, where he and fellow Five Percenters taught the recently revealed knowledge of self on the university’s campus and surrounding vicinities. They were reaching virgin soil with this urban-bred culture.
In 1971, Dumar became one of the principle founders of the NGE’s annual Show and Prove Weekend commemorating Allah’s June 13, 1969, assassination. He also helped establish Earth Appreciation Day, which acknowledges the organization’s women, and the PEACE program, which supports the NGE’s communal affairs.
Always advocating to properly educate all children equally, Dumar became an instructor at a Montessori school while still civilizing savages in the streets of New York. He implemented the Harlem Youth Olympics and an anti-drug youth program called Drugs Are For Dummies and worked with other groups like Citizens Action for a Safer Harlem, where he helped form tenant groups and block associations.
He was also a community environment youth coordinator at CUNY’s Hunter College, where he assisted in training and outreach in regards to environmental health issues, namely air and water pollution, lead poisoning and toxic waste dumping. His efforts led to prominent features in The New York Times and Newsday.
As the NGE’s national spokesman, Dumar’s dynamic oratory skills captivated audiences during their monthly parliaments at P.S. 154. The family-oriented community leader represented what the NGE is really about: education, community control and strong manhood.
Dumar’s legacy continues through his sister, Queen Cipher (brother-in-law God Akcu); his wife, Carmen; his children, Allah, Maia (son-in-law Maurice), Toriano (daughter-in-law Maisha), Shareese and Dumar (daughter-in-law Shannon); and his seven grandchildren.