Tony Abbott using citizenship debate to win next election, Muslim leader says
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Version 0 of 1. A Muslim community leader has accused Tony Abbott of using the citizenship discussion like the “reds under the bed” communist debate of the 1950s in order to win the next election. Silma Ihram, of the Australian Muslim Women’s Association, has also warned that some Muslim Australians could end up like the Rohingya people of Burma, left stateless or “shipped off to Cambodia”. She has joined the growing chorus of criticism by some government ministers and backbenchers, legal experts and community groups, over attempts to increase executive powers to revoke citizenship of suspected terrorists. Ihram told Guardian Australia that some Australian Muslims feel “numbed by the progress and speed of the government” on national security laws, such as the measure to strip the Australian citizenship from dual nationals suspected of terrorist offences on the approval of the minister rather than the courts. Ihram was also critical of Labor, after Bill Shorten agreed “in principle” with the bill which has yet to be released but is expected to come before the parliament in the next fortnight. “Labor has been led by the nose on this,” she said. Ihram, a former Islamic school principal, said in her experience the Coalition’s handling of the national security measures had soured relations between the government and the Muslim community. She said allowing citizenship to be stripped at the minister’s discretion was a great concern, given the government’s “heartless” response to the plight of the Rohingya refugees. “Some members of Muslim community [in Australia] could end up like Rohingya –stateless ... we could be the next lot shipped over to Cambodia,” Ihram said. “What the government is doing is to make this whole scenario of fear. Yes we have potential for [a terrorist] problem, no one is denying that. But the debate is had like the ‘reds under the bed’ so that [Abbott] can come out with solution and be voted back in.” After a bruising cabinet discussion on the citizenship issue was leaked to the media, the Abbott government is still considering stripping sole citizens suspected of terrorist offences if they can potentially access citizenship elsewhere. The measure is contained in a discussion paper on the rights and responsibilities of Australian citizenship and 40 government backbenchers have signed a letter of support to the prime minister, as long as such a measure does not leave anybody stateless. However one of those backbenchers, Queensland Liberal MP Ewen Jones, told the ABC on Monday he was disturbed by the level of racist hate mail he had received that was directed at Muslims. “I am very, very worried about the latent, for want of a better term, racism, that we are seeing in the country when it comes to our Muslim population,” he said. “I’m still getting people sending me stuff saying, ‘what about these bloody Muslims’ and you go back to them and say ‘you know that’s a false story’.” Also on Monday, former Howard government immigration minister Amanda Vanstone wrote a scathing opinion piece in Fairfax, critical of the government’s stance on citizenship and its preparedness to allow a minister alone to strip citizenship of alleged terrorists. Ihram said her own community was “extraordinarily frustrated” at the lack of any “real” consultation by the government with Muslim community groups. “It’s so one-sided,” she said. “Everyday in Australia we have murder and other crimes committed. We have women who are killed by their husbands but we don’t have any legitimate terror offences ... “Yet the amount of money put into negative policing and punitive measures has really soured relations between Muslim community and ramped up the sense of fear and isolation in the community.” Ihram said young Muslims were already contributing to Australian society with high levels of tertiary entrance rates and community participation but the government’s unhelpful rhetoric, such as Tony Abbott singling out the community, was isolating. “When the government suggests Muslims don’t have the same values Australians do – which is rubbish, [Isis] will say over social media to young Muslims, ‘they will never understand you, they will always fight against you’ and it all feeds straight into their rhetoric,” Ihram said. Ihram said she knows of no community groups which have had consultations with the government on the latest citizenship laws, although they have been writing letters to the government to give their views. But her organisation does receive a small amount of government funding for a research program for mentorship programs for community leaders. “This is a beat up, there are far more important issues, yes we need to deal with a potential threat but this is not way to handle it,” she said. “Everyone is going to lose so many freedoms under these laws.” |