The seven words from a Tory MP that reveal how rampant Islamophobia is in the Conservative Party

Nusrat Ghani & Boris Johnson


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A Tory MP has revealed how rampant Islamophobia is in the Tory Party while trying to defend Boris Johnson.

Speaking on LBC, Tory MP Michael Fabricant said that Nusrat Ghani’s accusations were a “lame excuse” for being sacked because she’s:

hardly someone who looks like a Muslim.

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Ghani was told by a government whip that “Muslimness was raised as an issue” as a reason for her sacking.

A politically vulnerable Johnson has now found himself forced to announce an inquiry into her sacking. It should come as little surprise that Johnson had to be under media – and therefore public – scrutiny to finally announce an inquiry. Ghani’s allegations of Islamophia were downplayed when they came to light two years ago. Instead, Ghani was told to go through the internal party complaints process.

The very use of the term ‘Muslimness’ is yet another reminder of the institutional Islamophobia that runs through the veins of the Tory party:

Racist politicians put BAME people in inherent danger

The Canary’s Afroze Fatima Zaidi has pointed out that the Tory party’s multiple instances of Islamophobia and racism. She has also listed the racial slurs that Boris Johnson has made over the years, from calling Black people “flag-waving piccaninnies” to stating that “Islam is the problem” in the wake of the London bombings. These bigoted comments are repeatedly ignored by a party that is in itself institutionally racist and Islamophobic. And while we have racist politicians in power, people of BAME backgrounds are inherently at risk. After Johnson’s article describing Muslim women as looking like “letter boxes” and “bank robbers”, there were serious consequences for Muslim women. Zaidi said:

In the week following the article’s publication, hate crime against Muslim women rose by an astronomical 375% – a stark reminder of the real-world consequences of racism from those in power. Johnson has repeatedly refused to apologise for these comments.

Of course, Tory racism doesn’t stop at Johnson. It’s important to remember that Ghani herself is instrumental to a party that seeks to divide its population by bringing more and more fascistic legislation into law, and by continuing worldwide domination through bombing Muslim countries.

Asim Qureshi, researcher at CAGE, argued:

The announcement of the Ghani inquiry comes after a long line of disgraceful racist policies and actions since the Tories came back into power. Zaidi pointed out that:

what’s also beyond doubt is the racism inherent in Tory policies over the last ten years. The Hostile Environment and Go Home vans, the mishandling of Grenfell, the Windrush scandal, the flourishing of the Prevent strategy, all happened under Tory rule.

So we probably shouldn’t be surprised by Johnson’s handling of Ghani’s dismissal, nor should we be surprised by the comments being made by Tory MPs defending the prime minister.

Statistics just published by Birmingham University have revealed that the Gypsy and Irish Traveller communities are  “least liked” in the UK, followed by Muslim people. With politicians like this having sway over the population, and with a mainstream media quick to parrot racist politicians, it’s tragically unsurprising.

Featured images via Wikimedia Commons under Creative Commons licences CC BY 3.0 and CC BY-SA 2.0, resized to 770px X 3403px

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  • Show Comments

      1. Fair point, Israel is one of the biggest pushers of Islamophobia, hence the Israeli flags, rabbis and speakers at far right EDL and Pegida demos. In fact Islamophobia was a band wagon Tony Blair jumped on a long time ago. Since Starmer’s financial backers are often the same racists & Islamophobes that supported Blair (e.g David Abrahams, Bicom etc), Labour is not really any better than the Tories

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    2. the only thing that surprises me is that it took this long for Nusrat Ghani to discover that the Tories are racist and islamophobic; what did she think they were? To them she is no more than a “useful idiot”, someone they keep around so that nobody learns what they are really like: Hitler kept two jewish SS officers around to trot out to ambassadors from neutral countries, to “prove” that rumours of anti-semitism and concentration camps were “bolshevik propaganda” it only proves that their are always idiots who will fight for the wrong side, like the notorious “Britisches Freikorps”, or , in America during the Revolution, “Butlers Rangers”

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