Haitham al-Haddad – Muslim Leader Reacts to General Elections 2024
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I think the results are very promising for
the Muslim community. I'm really,
very happy. Many Muslim leaders,
including the,
leaders who were involved in some of their
initiatives such as the Muslim vote,
as we can see in their website.
They are very happy. They are very excited.
Why is this?
Because
we had a number of aims,
behind this election
and behind our involvement. First of all, to
mobilize the Muslim community more.
And
by the way,
we were not just
planning to achieve
everything,
in this round.
Yeah. Mobilizing the Muslim community, it should happen
or it is happening through stages.
And this is an initial stage,
and we have still,
different we have still the future,
elections, and inshallah, the Muslim
the Muslim community will be mobilized more and
more.
So
this was
achieved because
at least the Muslim community this time was
more involved.
Even those who do not want to vote,
they were involved
in following up what is happening and,
you know,
messaging each other
and, you know,
and following the results of the the, elections.
Circulating some of
the eclipse, some of the, you know, the
outcome of the,
elections. This is 1 thing, the mobilization
of the Muslim community.
The second thing is,
to unify the Muslim community
in the political engagement.
This has happened.
Of course, it is it did not happen
as
we wanted it. And, as we dream
that it should happen, still there were
in some constituencies,
split of votes,
Bethanal Green and and some other areas in
in Birmingham, etcetera.
But in general in general, I think the
Muslim community
has done very well in terms of
unifying their,
votes
and voting strategically.
The third aim
was to,
of course, to punish
the main parties, the Labour Party, the Conservative
for because of Gaza.
And I think this has happened
clearly.
See,
this is a point many people think, oh,
look, the Labour Party won. It was
landslide. Yeah. Okay?
And it is they said it is the
biggest victory for them in since 18 something.
You can read
whatever happens
politically
from 2 different or from different angles.
Yes. From this side, yes. But do we
know?
And I think everyone knows that now, that
the Labour Party
got the lowest number of votes in this
election.
Less than
what the, previous 2 elections when they were
led by Jeremy Corbyn. Yeah?
This is this and despite that, they won.
Of course. Now many people say that the
political system
has to change because first pass of the
post has to change.
Every system has pros and cons, but the
point is
we need to analyze
what happened
carefully.
The point is,
yes, the
the the labor party
lost
the Muslim
vote
to a big extent.
Okay? To the fact that
even, many commentators, non Muslim commentators, even that
professor on BBC,
he commented on this. This he said this
is a proof that the Labour Party lost
because of Gaza, because of its position,
okay, on Gaza.
So this is a 1 for us,
and let alone some Labour Party
candidates
lost.
Not only that, but the biggest achievement is
that
many
those who won from the Labour Party,
they won with a very small margin.
I'll give you an example, a very clear
example. The the Labour Party candidate,
okay, without mentioning the name,
okay, won
by what a minor majority
over the independent party that we endorsed in
Bethnal Green. So,
that is an achievement.
That is a big achievement.
Okay. North,
Elford North. Yeah.
We should mention the name of Lianne,
Mohammed.
Okay?
She,
lost by 500
votes only.
In front of who?
In front of 1 of the key
labor party candidates
who has been there for years,
and he he's maybe double of her age.
Yeah. So that in of itself. And we
can mention also
Adnan Hussain. We can mention some other candidates.
So so,
so either we won, okay, maybe in 5,
6 constituencies,
or we came the biggest second
in many other constituencies.
So that is
that is a big win. And let me
take, as we mentioned, the name, although I
am trying to avoid mentioning names. Lianne Mohammed,
for example.
How old is she?
23. What is her political experience?
Is very minimal. She just won award when
she was 15, 16.
And,
to to to win and to lose by
just 500
votes in that area,
that is incredible.
That is incredible.
So that shows that the Muslim vote has
its weight,
and it can make a difference. And everyone
is talking about it now. So we should
not be pessimistic.
Look at just the the,
overall picture without deep analysis of what is
happening. Because in the political process, you cannot
do that. Yeah?
So this is so, to be honest with
you, congratulation
congratulation for the Muslim community.
Congratulation
for,
the Muslim votes and other campaigns.
This is really
a big achievement, and and this is like
a shift.
Okay? And this gives us some confidence that
we can make a change.
Yep.
Finally, I would like to say that, look
yeah. By the way, some of the the,
commentators
say that if Muslims
have
10, 000 votes
in the right places,
they would want 20 more
20 more constituencies.
20 more seats.
Just,
what, 10, 000 votes. And this is why
we say that, okay,
as we say in,
in in Bethlehem,
normally the gap between the labor candidate and
any other labor is around 10, 000 votes.
Now this time, the gap was 1, 600.
Okay?
So the point is this gives us confidence
that we can make a change, and the
Muslim vote should not be taken for granted.
Yeah? And we need now to move to
the other point. But before talking about the
other point,
you know, all of this, once we say
that, okay, the likes of
even even,
Adnan Hussein, not Adnan Hussein, 1 of the
candidates, 1 of our candidates, he won by
just less than 200 votes.
Yeah. So he could have lost.
Yeah? So what I am saying,
when I said that it is Wajib to
vote,
yeah,
this is
clear. We are talking about evidence here.
500 votes could have changed the whole
voting, okay, for many constituencies.
10, 000 votes, yeah, could have given us
more 20 seats.
So that's why every vote counts.
Let alone the experience that we got, the
involvement.
See, for me,
the biggest issue is for the Muslim community
to be engaged and to be involved.
Not to think that they can fix
the system while they are just criticizing
the system from outside. This cannot happen. Yeah?
And this means that they will remain in
their own bubbles, they will remain in their
own comfort zone, they will remain in the
margin, and they will not get into
the middle of the challenge. And by the
way,
this is easier for so many people to
remain in their comfort zone. That's why they
prefer to remain in their comfort zone rather
than to to, be involved
in in some challenging
processes
and long term processes.
I would like also to say that some
people say, oh, what did we achieve?
Have we ever said that
this election will
liberate Gaza?
Have we ever said that this election
will stop the war on Gaza?
Have we ever said that?
We never said that.
Okay? But it is 1 of them. It
is like attending a demonstration.
So many people in the beginning I remember
20 years ago when we were attending demonstrations,
people used to say some people used to
say, what is the point of attending some
the demonstrations?
Have you seen the war ending because of
that demonstration?
We said, yeah, maybe not this demonstration,
but it is all accumulative,
and it is all a project. We need
to
try in every,
in from every angle.
But to stay passive,
yeah,
this will not help in anything. And just
talking, talking, talking will not help in anything.
Now we need to move forward.
Yeah. We need to move forward. Khalas. Okay.
The elections have happened.
We need to learn the lessons.
We need to be more coordinated,
more united, more aware.
We need to produce
our brothers,
yeah, who can
be who can represent us in the parliament.
Yeah. We cannot
stay as as a passive community. We are
part and parcel. We are the second,
you know, the second largest
faith community
in the UK after Christianity.
It is the Muslim
community. Okay? Of course, the, the the the,
atheist.
Okay?
I don't know whether we call them faith
community or not. So we are not a
small community. We are not a, a minority.
In fact, in in terms of religions,
okay, we are the biggest religion
next to Christianity.
Okay? So we should be proud of ourselves.
We should be confident of who we are.
And see, look look, the labor commune the
the labor party or the conservative party, how
long they been in politics?
Yeah. What?
200 plus years?
How long we've been
in politics? Look, the Muslim vote and other
initiatives, they started to mobilize maybe 6 months
ago,
and we have achieved this.
And then we say, we didn't achieve anything.
Some brothers, unfortunately,
and sisters,
they have this negative mindset, and they want
either they have the black and white mentality.
Okay? Tunnel vision.
Either you achieve all or none.
Okay? Life is not like this. And when
you raise your expectations,
you will be always
disappointed
because you will never
see what you expected. Even in our life,
You know, if you raise your expectations with
your wife, with your children, with your neighbor,
with everyone,
you'll never be satisfied with anything because
your expectations would be so high. And whatever
they you see, whatever achievement you see, you
don't see it as an achievement. So be
positive, brothers and sisters. I think it is,
really a very good,
a very good outcome,
of of the election,
2024,
and keep it up. And by the way,
I just want to say that either today,
tomorrow, or the day after tomorrow is the
1st year of the hijra year.
So the hijra year of 1446.