Another Islamic School, Another Protest Planned

I have always thought that Australia was a multicultural society, a tolerant society, a society who valued and respected hard work, a society that embraced diversity. Perhaps this is the eternal optimist in me, the part of me that always wants to see the best in people and places. Some might even be tempted to be cynical and suggest that I am in denial. A denial of how things really are.

I am proud to be Australian! Always have been and always will be. That does not mean I have to agree with what other Australians do and neither does it mean they speak on my behalf.

After the racially driven anti-Islamic school ruckus in Camden some months ago there is more trouble brewing, this time in Austral, a suburb within the Liverpool City Council area. Some might argue that the Camden decision was purely a zoning and environmental suitability issue and the fact that the development proposal was from the Quranic Society was irrelevant. The footage that played out on the TV and commentary in the media would suggest that religion had everything to do with the ultimate decision even though it might have been packaged some other way.

These tensions are about to be reignited as a company called ASFA has lodged a development proposal with the Liverpool City Council to build a joint primary school and high school facility to be known as Qaadari College. The student capacity is expected to be no more than 600 pupils. I am not sure that there are any requirements that you have to be a Muslim to enrol or that you have to agree to become a Muslim to enrol.

In comparison, I teach at a few universities in Indonesia, one of which was established by a Christian family and maintains a Christian philosophy. I have noticed some Muslim faces in the crowd, those wearing the Jilbab or Hijab, so the policy is clearly not one of exclusion or inclusion based on religion. So, if this were to be the case with Qaadari College would this make any difference? Would it make any difference if the development proposal was from a group wanting to build a 600 pupil college to be known as St Paul's College?

The residents near the proposed school say that it would not matter. There only concern is that a 600-pupil school will destroy the serenity they currently enjoy and upset the peacefulness of the area. I am guessing the peacefulness here is not some Zen Buddhist approach to life. Maybe the concern is that if it is a Muslim school then there are sure to be the obligatory call to prayer. So, maybe this is what will disturb the peace?

If this is true then so be it. However, even if it is true then the agenda is seemingly just about to be hijacked by those keen to promote and highlight the ills of a multicultural Australia and those that are keen to use such development applications to promote an anti-immigration platform and the value of maintaining an Anglo-Celtic-European-white heritage. If you want to check out the thought patterns of these individuals then register at australianidentity.net and have a read for yourself. You cannot get on without registering first.

There you will find these little pearls of wisdom:

"Multiculturalism means never having to go overseas to find an enemy."
- Anonymous

If this does not tell you what these people are about then you do not understand the subtlety of the sledge hammer. The above is the signature of someone known as Casapound. I do not know whether this is important but Casapound is a "Hero Member". I suppose the site sets out how one becomes a hero member but I have not gotten that far into the site to find out.

My guess is that those opposed to the development proposal will be organizing themselves through sites such as this one and others. Is this the beginning of a return to the past, a reinventing of the White Australia policy, an immigration policy reliant on the color of your skin and not on your ability to contribute to the Australian community? If it is then this is a scary prospect.

My concern is that these proposals are not being considered on merit but rather on the basis or fear and intimidation. For me, fear and intimidation is not the Australian way, or at least it should not be in 2008.

I want my kids to grow up in an Australia that is tolerant of the great diversity that we have.

These are things for me to ponder.

Postscript...

You do not have to register to browse on the Australian Identity site. I did have to register to leave a comment.

Muslim Burial Grounds -- Camden

It is said that there are only two things that are certain in life, death and taxes.

There can be no dispute that death can be big business particularly when people seem to be doing it at regular intervals. The premium on space in and of itself makes privately owned and operated cemeteries an attractive business prospect.

However, when the new owners of a previously held Anglican cemetery are Muslims and that cemetery is in the same local government area as a recent development application for an Islamic School that was vigorously opposed and ultimately voted down, then the fun and games are sure to start all over again.

The current ruckus surrounds the purchase of the St Thomas Anglican Cemetery in Narellan by the Lebanese Muslim Association. This was no minor outlay considering that the LMA paid AUD 1.5 million for the land. It is also worth noting that the former owner of the site bought it for a mere AUD 90,000 in 2004 (photo by Quentin Jones).

The cemetery itself has space for 4000 bodies and it is expected that this will provide some relief from the current shortage of space. Not all religions allow for cremations, which to my mind, is the ultimate space saver, so there is a need for new land to be made available for cemeteries.

The LMA has issued a prospectus that states that the An-Nur Islamic Cemetery and Burial Ground will have space for 1900 single plots and 3800 double plots and can conceivably cater for the needs for burial space in Sydney's south-west for 10 to 15 years.

Presumably, this is the Muslim community's needs that are being catered for. The reality is that there is only one New South Wales cemetery with a dedicated Muslim section and that is Rookwood. Rookwood is running out of space across the board in terms of how many more graves it can accommodate.

The sale seems to have angered some locals who feel that the heritage of the site should have been protected and the site should never have been sold. Some are even arguing that the Anglican Church did not have a right to sell the land. Yet, it was the Anglican Church who decided to sell the site to a funeral firm, Camden Valley Funerals, headed by William and Christine Cole in 2004, and it is this funeral firm that has since sold the site to the LMA.

The history of the cemetery dates at least from 1839 when official records started to be kept. So, there are families who can trace ancestors back almost 170 years in the cemetery. The Coles have apparently insisted that any development of the land respect the graves presently there and that the land be divided up into both Muslim and non-Muslim sections. It is not clear whether this insistence is reflected in the contract of sale though.

Nonetheless, it would be a reasonable request that graves presently on the site not be demolished or moved without the consent of the families involved. The Camden Council has listed the site in the Local Environment Plan which means that any moving of the graves would require council approval.

Nevertheless, Shawky Kassir, President of the Muslim Association, has indicated that the present graves would be protected. He is also confident that the idea of a Muslim cemetery in the area is not going to generate the same sort of fierce opposition that the Quranic Society's application to build a school did.

I guess time will tell on this front.

A Camden Update...

The reaction in the press has been swift and this reaction has reached not only Indonesia but much further afield to the like of the United Kingdom from whence us convicts originated from many a generation ago!

As I posted earlier, it seems that there are others that are also of the belief that the ability of the Camden Council to reject the proposal based on traffic concerns seemed all too convenient and a little too political.

Since the decision last night a huge wooden crucifix has been erected on the site and a passage from the Bible affixed to it that reads:

"David and Goliath. The battle is won. This is the King of Kings Land. Prayer is essential in this ongoing warfare. (Eph 6:18)."

Let me play Devil's Advocate here for a bit and raise a few questions.

Some of the interviews with local residents reflected that the happiness that they felt with the rejection of the development proposal had nothing to do with planning issues but an intense desire not to have Muslims in the community because they would build Mosques, ghetto-ize Camden, and make Camden a hot bed of fundamentalist Islamic activity.

1. Is Australia truly a multicultural nation or is that just lip service to an ideal?

2. Isn't it true that racism is alive and well in Australian small towns with limited numbers of migrants?

3. Would this planning / development proposal been rejected if the school was to be an Anglican, Catholic, Protestant, or Jewish school?

4. Isn't it true that schools have always been built in rural areas and usually on farm land converted for that purpose?

There are probably a thousand other questions I could ask but these four will suffice for now.

I am certain that the Quranic Society will appeal this decision to the Land and Environment Court and I think they have a good chance of winning. It seems the objections on which the Council based its decision play more to political expediency than good development sense.

There is also a history in the sense that the last time a similar case came before the Court where a development application was rejected by the Baulkham Hills Council for an Islamic Prayer Hall for reasons that it did not fit the community profile, the Council decision was overturned by the Court. The prayer hall has been built!

For Australia to really move forward and become a leader in community relations we have to escape this culture of fear and religious intolerance.

Multi-Cultural Australia?

It is being reported that the Camden Council has rejected a development proposal submitted by the Qu'uranic Society (the spelling is how it is the story -- but I would have thought Quranic or Qur'anic -- that's just me though) to build a 1200-student Islamic School on land it bought in the Camden area. Camden is located south-west of Sydney.

The Mayor, Chris Patterson, issued a statement immediately after the vote was taken saying that the decision was one based solely on issues of traffic management and the loss of agricultural land but most definitely not on religious grounds. Although I have not read the planning reports, and the planning reports recommended that the Council reject the proposal, it does sound all a little convenient.

The Council received some 3000 submissions on the proposal and only 50 were for the development. So, even if the planning recommendation was to permit the development the Council would have been between a rock and a hard place with almost 3000 residents rejecting the proposal. Some suggest that the community was divided over the application. However, the breakdown above would suggest that any suggestion of community division is a bit of a furphy. If the community was truly divided on the proposal then those community members that were for the development did not make their support all that well known.

The interest in the vote saw some 200 Camden residents attend the meeting and apparently a loud cheer erupted when the Council confirmed that it had rejected the proposal. Community feeling was definitely not running with the Qu'uranic Society on this school development.

Anti-proposal rallies attracted up to a 1000 people! This culminated in some one deciding to impale a couple of pig's heads on spikes and string an Australian flag up between the heads. This to me sounds very un-Australian for a land that prides itself on tolerance and acceptance of difference. The spiking of the pig heads also does not seem to have any relevance with the land and traffic issues identified by other stake holders, the intent was to offend and to stake claim to the land as Australian land.

The Qu'uranic Society can appeal the decision to the Land and Environment Court. However, this would require the court to not only overturn the decision but to go against the reports submitted by the Department of Primary Industries, the Roads and Traffic Authority, and the NSW Police who all rejected the proposed development.

A more likely scenario after spending AUD 1.5 million on acquiring the land and a further AUD 250,000 on the proposal is that the Qu'uranic Society will sell up and seek land in a more favourable Council area where there are unlikely to be primary industry or traffic concerns.

I wonder home multi-cultural is Australia really? Is this just an isolated incident or is it endemic of a much wider-spread of fear and loathing to that which we might not understand or that we fear?

The residents of Camden have spoken!