LONDON: According to The Guardian newspaper, the recently declared London mayoral candidate for the right-wing British party Reform UK came under fire on Friday for remarks that implied women wearing the burqa ought to be subject to police stop-and-searches. Laila Cunningham stated on a podcast that people should not cover their faces in a “open society,” adding that it “has to be assumed” that those who do so are doing it “for a criminal reason.
Additionally, she contended that London should have “one civic culture” that “should be British,” asserting that the presence of Muslim communities in some areas of the British city made them feel culturally distinct. The number of Muslim women who wear the burqa in this country is tiny, and yet this is what has been chosen as a focus,” she said, cautioning that doing so could encourage abuse.
Gohir claimed that Cunningham’s remarks were “sending a message to Muslims that they do not belong” and that her organization has recently noticed an increase in threatening and Islamophobic communications.
Manchester-based Labour MP Afzal Khan described Cunningham’s remarks as a “deliberate and cynical ploy,” adding that they were “about divisive ideas being pumped into the society deliberately for electoral benefits. London Mayor Sadiq Khan, who stated that the mayor’s job was to unite communities, also denounced efforts to sow discord.
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