By Popular Resistance. Bethesda, MD – The members of Macedonia Baptist Church (MBC,) established in 1920, one of the oldest African churches in Montgomery County is engaged in a fight with financial powerhouse Equity One in its pursuit to plunder an African cemetery associated with the church and its members. The current membership of MBC is composed, in part, of descendants of the original African community on River Road.

The MBC community, located in the center of one of the wealthiest communities in the US was once a thriving community of descendants of liberated enslaved Africans in the mid-1860s. The homes of the River Road African community were stolen by developers and the graves desecrated. After the tombstones were discarded, Montgomery County allowed a builder to pave over the graves and build an HOC apartment building and a parking lot. It was hoped that this crime against humanity would never be discovered.