‘Don’t let terrorists sway your vote’
Community hopes atrocity will not skew UK election, resulting in choices that will have divisive long-term repercussions
MANCHESTER // Muslim groups, Christian pastors, Jewish community leaders and devout Hindus gathered in St Ann’s Square in the city for a memorial event for those killed in the terrorist attack.
The vigil, organised by the Ramadhan Foundation, a local Muslim non- profit body, was held on Wednesday amid a mixed mood of apprehension and assurance.
As populist nationalism surges across the western world, and as the United Kingdom heads into a general election in two weeks, Manchester’s Muslims were eager to show that their religion is entirely separate from the acts of violence that are committed in its name.
Police identified Salman Abedi, a 22-year-old man of Libyan descent, as the suicide bomber who killed 22 people at Manchester’s MEN Arena on Monday.
Police said he did not work alone and that a support network helped him carry out the attack. Ten other people, including two of Abedi’s brothers, have been taken into custody – in Manchester and Tripoli, the Libyan capital. One woman detained in Manchester was released. Manchester’s community of British Libyans issued a statement condemning the bomber’s actions.
“This attack was an attack on all of us,” it said.
“All those responsible for senselessly destroying the lives of innocent people do not deserve to live in our community and should be behind bars.”
At St Ann’s Square in the centre of Manchester, Mansoor Ahmad Khan, the regional head of Al Islam, an association of Ahmadiyya Muslims, admitted being concerned about the public image of Muslims after terrorist attacks.
“Whenever such things happen, there’s a worry that people will begin to think badly of us as a group, or they will use this as an excuse to discriminate,” he said. Although Manchester has been mostly peaceful since the attack, several incidents have rattled the nerves of the city’s Muslims.
On Tuesday, the English Defence League ( EDL), a rightwing nationalist group, staged a protest urging people to “stand up to Islamism”.
In another incident, a 14-yearold girl walking to the Manchester Islamic High School for Girls had abuse shouted at her by another pedestrian.
“When are you going to stop bombing people?” they shouted. The door of a mosque was burnt down on Wednesday, although the mosque’s imam, Mohammad Sadiq, did not know if it was connected to the bomb attack.
With the UK’s general election on June 8, Mr Khan was also worried about possible political repercussions from the attack – fearing it may lead people to vote more right wing. The United Kingdom Independence Party ( Ukip), a farright party that won 12.6 per cent of the national vote in the 2015 election, labels Islamic schools as a threat to the country and wants the full-face veil banned.
One of its parliamentary candidates for the upcoming election, Anne Marie Waters, tweeted last year: “The only ‘evil’ we have legalised is Islam.”
At the moment, Ukip is polling at less than 5 per cent, said polling agency YouGov.
Najib, a taxi driver from Kurdistan, moved to Manchester 19 years ago. He feared terror attacks would bolster wariness of immigrants and draw some voters towards Ukip.
“This country has been very good to me,” he said.
“I really hope it won’t close itself off.”
Immigration was already an area of contention in British politics.
The success of the Leave campaign in last year’s Brexit referendum was driven, in large part, by its argument that the country would be more secure if its borders were less porous to immigrants from the Middle East through Europe.
Ahead of next month’s election, prime minister Theresa May’s Conservative Party has pledged to slash annual net immigration to figures in the tens of thousands rather than in the hundreds of thousands. Muslims who are already in the UK, including those who have never lived anywhere else, hope they will not have to contend with an increase in anti-Islam sentiment.
One of the participants in Wednesday’s vigil at St Ann’s Square was Gulnar Bano , a born- and- bred Mancunian who helps to set up community non-profits.
Ms Bano said that after 9/11 she faced derisive and abusive comments from passers- by: “‘Oh, look at you, Paki, with your [ head] scarf,’ they’d say.” She wore a headscarf on Wednesday as well – except it was a silken Union flag.
But in the aftermath of the Manchester attack, she said, the reaction has been different.
“I’ve actually received more respect than normal,” she said.
“I’ve been on trains and trams, in hospitals and on buses, I’ve been to a lot of places. And I’ve been treated so well.
“It’s really, really unique. But that’s Manchester.”
‘ I’ve been on trains and trams, in hospitals and on buses, I’ve been to a lot of places. And I’ve been treated so well Gulnar Bano Manchester resident