Witch-hunt at the Met

[Thinking Man's Idiot]

Witch-hunt at the Met

(Friday 19 September 2008)

by PAUL HASTE

ANTI-RACISM campaigners backed a mutiny by embattled black officers against London's Metropolitan Police chiefs on Friday after one of the most senior Asian commanders in the force was suspended yet again.



Dissident police commander Ali Dizaei was suspended from duty for alleged inappropriate use of his corporate credit card and advising defence counsel in a case which the Met was prosecuting.

Mr Dizaei is president of the Metropolitan Black Police Association (MBPA) and a close adviser to the Met's highest ranking ethnic minority officer, Assistant Commissioner Tarique Ghaffur - who has also been suspended after he accused the force of racial discrimination last week.

MBPA chairman Alfred John slammed the Met's attacks as a "farcical and sustained witch-hunt.

"Without a doubt, this an attempt by senior commanders to destabilise our movement."

He stated that black and Asian officers would no longer co-operate with police chiefs and flatly declared that the MBPA "has no confidence" in the Met's top officers.

Anti-racism campaigners Operation Black Vote said that black, Asian and other minority officers were right to take "this strong political stand against institutional racism" in the force.

Co-ordinator Ashok Viswanathan said: "We absolutely back the MBPA call for officers not to co-operate with their superiors."

Commander Dizaei has been the target of several attacks for speaking out about the racism that ethnic minority police officers endure and for criticising the Met's racial profiling of suspects as "creating a new crime of 'travelling while Asian'."

A previous investigation against him saw the Met humiliated when their £5 million surveillance operation resulted in the accusation that Mr Dizaei had falsely claimed the princely sum of £50 in travel allowances.

The charge of corruption was thrown out by an Old Bailey jury in 2003, but Mr John said that the commander's "disproportionate treatment" showed how little had changed since the Macpherson report exposed widespread racism in the force a decade ago.

Mr John said that the MBPA would campaign to warn young would-be officers from diverse backgrounds not to join the Met.

"There are many cases of racial discrimination in the police awaiting employment tribunal. Even the Police Federation admits that it has to take 15 to 20 cases each year," he pointed out.

National Association of Muslim Police president Zaheer Ahmad added that even the force's head of diversity Yasmin Rehman has now revealed that she intends to sue the Met for discrimination.

"There must be a problem when the two most senior Asian Muslim officers in the country have actually been suspended," he said.