Scotland’s multicultural society faces one of its biggest tests today as the threat of the first ever anti-Muslim protest north of the Border prompts an unprecedented mass demonstration against racism in Glasgow.
The anti-racism event, dubbed Scotland United, takes place after the British National Party achieved a record number of votes in Scotland in the Glasgow North East by-election, coming fourth close behind the Conservatives, and the country comes to terms with one of the worst race-hate crimes it has seen.
On Tuesday Christopher Miller, 25, from Glasgow, was jailed for a minimum of 18 years after being found guilty of the racist murder of Kunal Mohanty, an Indian naval officer who was in the city to sit his captain’s exams. CCTV cameras captured Miller celebrating as his victim bled to death from the 18cm wound his attacker slashed in his neck.
Osama Saeed, one of the organisers of the Scotland United rally, and head of the Scottish Islamic Foundation, a charity that aims to promote better relationships with the Muslim community, admitted it has been a “testing” week. “These are challenges, and it is for the country to respond,” he said.
The rally is taking place to counter plans by the Scottish Defence League (SDL), a far Right organisation affiliated to the English Defence League (EDL), to hold its first protest in Scotland. Previous rallies staged by the EDL in England and Wales have ended in ugly scenes following confrontations with opponents and police.
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In September, there were 90 arrests when anti-facist demonstrators, including many young Asian men, clashed with EDL protesters in Birmingham. Riot police were also struck by bricks. Last month, there were almost 50 arrests at an EDL rally in Manchester that ended in fighting. One man suffered a head injury but did not require hospital treatment.
Mr Saeed insisted that the Scotland United demonstration would be peaceful, and highlighted its cross-sector support. “One of the things we want to show with our event is that we’re learning from the mistakes made down south, where it has been left to the far Left to counter the far Right,” he said.
“We have about 30 to 40 groups and some prominent individuals taking part. We want to show that Scottish civic society is getting behind the Muslim population.”
Among those attending will be Mark Thomas, the comedian, Elaine C. Smith, the actress, and Dave Moxham, deputy general secretary of the Scottish Trade Unions Congress. Also addressing the event will be Nicola Sturgeon, the Deputy First Minister, Annabel Goldie, the leader of the Scottish Conservatives, and Mohammed Sarwar, the Glasgow Labour MP. Demonstrators are meeting at Glasgow Green, the scene of some of Scotland’s most historic protests, before marching via the city centre to George Square.
Mr Moxham said: “The key message is that the fascists should not gain an organisational foothold. It was an enormous sorrow for us to see them come so close on Thursday to retaining their deposit in the by-election.”
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Ms Sturgeon claimed that most Scots reject racism. “Scotland is rightly proud of its multicultural diversity,” she said. “A place where people from all backgrounds — irrespective of their race, faith, belief and place of birth — feel respected.”
Campaigners have different views over the causes of the racial tensions simmering in Scotland. The Rev Ian Galloway, convenor of the Kirk’s Church and Society Council, thinks that ignorance is at the heart of Scotland’s racial tensions. “It’s people who have got to find someone to blame, and it is possible for people to spread prejudice to one another when the only people they’re talking to is one another,” he said. “Anyone who knows Glasgow and knows Scotland knows most people are talking to each other across the divisions, and our fears disappear when that happens.”
But Mr Saeed suggests that poverty is at the root of the problem. “We are heading into the grip of an ever-tightening economic crisis,” he said. “In the 1930s, the far Right grew on the back of the Depression. We have yet to see many job cuts, and the contemporary far Right will try to exploit this.”
What is not at dispute is that racism is a blight on Scottish society. According to figures published by the Scottish government, the number of racist crimes recorded by police has remained steady over the last few years. In 2007-2008 there were 5,243 incidents, a decrease of 1 per cent compared with the previous year.
Statistics from Strathclyde Police, Scotland’s biggest force, and the one covering the area with the largest minority ethnic population, paint a different picture. Figures released by Strathclyde for 2008-2009 show that the force recorded 2,287 racist incidents, compared with 1,837 five years ago. Although the figures dipped slightly compared with the previous year, the overall trend shows racism is on the rise.
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The increase in racial tension in the west of Scotland is in part due to better recording of incidents — police now encourage “third parties”, such as family members or friends, to report crimes, in addition to the victim — but mostly because of a large influx of asylum seekers, who have settled in Glasgow under the local authority’s dispersal policy.
Kay Hampton, an expert in communities and race relations at Glasgow Caledonian University, has been studying racism in Scottish society for more than ten years. She is convinced that, despite a series of anti-racism initiatives, the country has become more intolerant.
“When I started working here racism was graffiti on Asian shops,” Professor Hampton said. “It shouldn’t be tolerated but it was low level. Now we have a situation where people think it is OK to kill someone and celebrate.”
Professor Hampton believes that there needs to be a concerted campaign to make racism unacceptable, similar to the effort to persuade the public that there had to be a ban on smoking in public places.
“We need to stop being so knee-jerk in Scotland,” she said. “We have gone from being, ‘oh well, it is not as bad here as it is in England’, to racist murders, including Imran Khan, Kriss Donald, and now Kunal Mohanty, and attacks on asylum seekers in between. One racist murder is one racist murder too many.”