Pakistani-born Mehreen Faruqi becomes Australia’s first female Muslim senator. The Green party’s MP from New South Wales was appointed on a vacant seat on Wednesday. The new senator is likely to hold office from next week.
According to a private TV channel, Mehreen’s family had migrated to Australia from Pakistan in 1992.
Other than politics, Mehreen has a PHD degree in environmental engineering. Her selection to the state parliament in 2013 made her the first Muslim woman to hold any political office in Australia.
Being a staunch critic of racism, Mehreen has always stood firm against the racist elements in Australian politics.
In an interview with BBC, she shared that she will use her new role to achieve a “positive future for Australia where we are stronger for our diversity”.
Mehreen, openly condemned the recent incidents of racism in Australia. She remarked that such incidents do not happen in isolation, and we need to deal with the problem of racism in depth.
She also criticised Australian Senator from Queensland, Fraser Anning’s use of the Holocaust-associated term for Muslims which called for a complete ban of Muslims in Australia.
Mehreen told Guardian that Anning’s speech had thrown millions of decent Australians under the bus in a “desperate attempt to remain relevant and reignite a long-gone racist policy”.
She further said, “Senator Anning has spat in the face of our successful multicultural society, but I wouldn’t expect anything less from an ex-One Nation senator. These merchants of hate in the Senate will stop at nothing to keep attacking non-white people, simply for the sake of sowing division in our country and for their narrow political interests.”
Feeling proud of her religious affiliation, Mehreen stated. “I am Muslim migrant, I’m about to be a Senator and there’s not a damn thing Fraser Anning can do about it,” she wrote this in a piece for a website.
Published in Daily Times, August 16th 2018.