GLASGOW – A Muslim of Pakistani origin is not deemed Scottish enough to run and get elected in the European country.
“I can’t support your bid and can’t vote for you because Scotland isn’t ready for a brown, Muslim Pakistani,” a councilor from the Scottish Labour Party told Anas Sarwar, a Glasgow Parliament Member, during his campaign to be Scottish Labour leader last summer, The Daily Record reported.
Sarwar recalled what another senior Labour member told him during the election. “I had been planning to back you for leader until I saw a picture of your wife wearing a hijab.”
In response, Sarwar revealed to her that his wife Furheen “was born in Scotland, raised in Scotland, she studied at Glasgow University, she is a dentist by profession, she works in the National Health Service (NHS). She is a normal, passionate, and hard-working Scot.”
Referring to Scottish values, Sarwar explained “Anyone who believes in gender equality should respect the woman’s choice, regardless of what religion the person happens to come from. That is a fundamental Labour principle.”
In his interview with Daily Record, Sarwar said: “What I am hoping to do by talking about this is to call out these incidents so we hold ourselves to a higher standard and we start talking about racism and Islamophobia in the same way we do about other forms of prejudice.”
Sarwar, the 34-year-old son of the UK’s first Muslim MP, Mohammad Sarwar, lost out to Richard Leonard in the leadership contest, which was sparked by Kezia Dugdale’s resignation.
This unfortunate experience left Sarwar determined to tackle racism in the Scottish society. He planned to launch the Scottish Parliament’s first cross-party group on tackling Islamophobia next Tuesday.
“We rightly talk about everyday sexism, we rightly talk about everyday homophobia, we don’t talk about everyday racism, we don’t talk about everyday Islamophobia,” he said.
“The fact of the matter is that Islamophobia is on the rise both in Scotland, across the UK and, indeed, right across the world.
“What I am hoping to go through the cross-party group on Islamophobia is provide a platform for us to talk about it and to allow people to voice their concerns and look at the legislative framework.”
Sarwar believes terrorist incidents have fuelled Islamophobia around the world, with the problem particularly prominent online. Recorded hate crimes towards Muslims in Scotland almost doubled between 2015 and 2016.
He insisted it was not just an issue for the Labour Party, adding: “Political parties are representative of wider society in different ways.”
“I didn’t want the race to be an issue in the leadership contest because I was standing, because I wanted to represent all parts of Scotland,” Sarwar expressed.