هوفستيد دايمنشن ونحن اهل السودان( ملحوظة : ليس من المواضييع ذات الاقبال الجماهيري)

The Fresh mates and Kevin Andrew
BY Mohamed Hasabrabo



I am one of those who ended up walking down the streets of Sydney with their hands in their pockets, smiles on their faces and an astonished look in their eyes implying that they could hardly believe that, at last, they had made it to Australia, the land of dreams, the place where they can lay down their worries, forget the haunting and traumatic experiences they went through and hope for a better life for ever. I was filled with hope for a peaceful life and opportunities as part of the easy-going Australian life.


As my wandering across the avenues of the Australian life continues, I arrived at the harsh conclusion that this was not the Australia that I had pictured in my mind when I was a refugee waiting for a response from the Australian embassy in Cairo for eighteen months. This is not the enlightened, fair and tolerant Australia that I had imagined and that I loved before I saw it. Unfortunately, the map is wrong, the territory is right. This is something I have to swallow like the other African refugees who ended up here hopping to live with dignity and respect after years of dehumanization in the refugee camps.


Everything we had fantasized about is here but alongside it exists a battle of survival from the racially-motivated attacks and the defamatory statements that, finally, were formalised by the decision of Kevin Andrews', the Minster of Immigration, concerning African refugees. He decided to cutback Australia's intake from Africa from 30% of the overall intake of 13 thousand refugees annually. The percentage was 70 percent in 2004-2005, reduced to 50 in 2006-2007, then to 30 percent in 2007 and finally to zero by the latest decision this month. The Minster based his decision on the opinion that "[Africans] are experiencing more difficulties than others adapting to the Australian life". He singled out the Sudanese youth and accused them of "forming racial gangs and attacking people in Victoria".


When a friend of mine told me that the worst three things to be in Sydney are: black, Muslim and an Arabic speaker I laughed, thinking that he was joking, but guess what: in 2005, a professor from Macquarie University in Sydney wrote an article describing the presence of the Sudanese in Sydney as "a sure recipe for crime and violence ". He also accused Africans of stupidity and having low IQs, then concluded that "The Australian government does not stand to benefit from their presence". After that the attacks on us followed. While a Sudanese young man was coming from work at night he was attacked by a group of youth and left to die on the streets of Auburn near the Auburn City council area. He passed away and left a widow and a number of children behind.

In mid - 2006, two Sudanese men working as security guards were attacked while on duty in Penrith station by a group of people. One of them sustained permanent damage to his eyes and the other suffered the loss of four of his teeth as a result of beating.

In the early morning of December 9, 2006, Geoffery Taban, who had just completed his first year studying Economics at the University of New South Wales, was attacked by unknown people at a night club in Paramatta. He remained in coma for an entire week at Westmead Hospital before passing away on December 16 2006.


Following the attack on Geoffery, two Sudanese young men were attacked in the same night club, one of them died later and the other suffered permanent damage to his brain remaining at Westmead Hospital struggling for his life.

Another Sudanese young man committed suicide by throwing himself under the train at Blacktown station in 2005. On top of that are the verbal attacks and empty bottles of beer thrown from speeding cars at us. Then the Tamworth City councilors rejected the presence of the Sudanese in their area after one of them was caught "over speeding". This are documented attacks that can be checked and cross checked, not to mention the undocumented ones.

One of the worst blows came from Australia's main stream media when it simply ignored these incidents as if they didn't happen. Even SBS, the channel that claims to serve multiculturalism. Channel Seven showed CCTV images of drunken Sudanese youth fighting in a night club. That is understandable because no black person in this country expects less than that form Channel 7, but what about SBS?


In June 2006, the Community Relations Commission for Multicultural NSW released a report, "Investigation into African Humanitarian settlement in NSW". The report was a result of joint effort and heavy consultation between the government agencies working with new migrants from Africa and their communities. The commission received various submissions from the Migrant Resource Centers (MRC) and the city councils, addressing all the aspects of African re-settlement in NSW, from Health, Education and employment to Racism, community relations and crime.


The report revealed that some African women were targeted by racist remarks because of their backgrounds and their adherence to traditional dress standards, and that most of the racist remarks went unreported to bodies like the Anti-Discrimination Commission and the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission because of lack of knowledge that such things could be reported.

A submission from the Blacktown MRC remarked how the physical differences of the Africans and their color make them more visible and thus a target for racism. Fairfield city council pointed out the harmfulness of Australia's mainstream media coverage and comments from talkback radio programs that resulted in generalizations about education levels, language skills and health issues that created negative images of Africans in the mind of Australians. Some parents contacted schools saying that they didn't want their kids sitting near children from African backgrounds.


In regard to the suggestion that crime figures in the Blacktown area have risen in proportion to the settlement of Africans in the area, Blacktown city council indicated that police figures in Blacktown show that African involvement in crime is not high compared to the rest of the population.


In addition to that, the report raised the concerns of the African communities over many issues including over-policing situations, racist attitudes of city rail transit officers, stereotypes related to health issues and the financial burden that fines, often resulting from minor misdemeanor offenses, put on the shoulders of the new arrivals.


Further more, the report spoke about how, from the experiences of homeland situations in Africa, people in uniforms are always associated with abuse in the minds of Africans which is something that could turn any encounter with the police into trouble.

The report pointed at the accountability of the young profile of the African communities, acknowledge the circumstances involved and the lack of appropriate government services concerning some areas of the new migrant's services.


Let us examine the first reason Mr. Kevin Andrew gave us, that "they are experiencing more difficulties than others adapting to the Australian life". The problem is real and it exists but what about the causes? Shall we just leave it there or explore it together?


A common shared experience of being here in Australia for those who came from Africa is that you are left with insufficient cultural orientation, to figure out situations for yourself by trial and error, sometimes at a very high cost. Those whose applications were approved by the Australians embassies overseas have to undergo medical testing and a six hour culture orientation before being granted the visa. The six hour cultural orientation introduces you to Australia using video recordings and practical information about the weather and the system in Australia. It also aims at helping the new migrants to build realistic expectations. In other words it tells them "not to go bananas".

But even with that, it is not enough, and you have to figure it out for yourself when you come here any way. You will encounter things the culture orientation dose not prepares you for.


The geography of thought, a study on how the westerners' ways of thinking differ from that of the Asians, showed that while westerners see the world as a line the Asians see the world as a circle. In other words while Asians consider all the circumstances involved in a phenomenon or a problem, westerners tend to focus on specific single factor or factors. The famous wheat crisis between Japan and Australia illustrates how the two different ways of thinking affect the way each party sees the world. Japan signed a contract of wheat supply with Australia for twenty years. When the prices of wheat in the international market had dramatically fallen, the Japanese wanted to renegotiate the terms of the contract saying that, in their culture, contracts are flexible agreements and should be renegotiated if circumstances have changed to maintain the satisfaction of each party. To the Australians, with their western way of thinking, a contract is a contract regardless of a change in circumstances and they shipped the wheat to the Japanese any way. The crisis erupted.


The aspects of the western way of thinking that a new arrival from Africa encounters here are different from those the Japanese had encountered.


"Any person approaches each situation with at least one concern about what's in it for me and thus enlightened self interest is welcomed and appreciated"

The Enlightened self interest is one of the key things in the western mind and is taken for granted. But guess what: in my culture you don't get the job or the deal if you showed enthusiasm or enlightened self interest in it. That evokes doubts and suspicions. You have to show reluctance in accepting the job or taking the deal.

Then, a Sudanese new migrant, ends up in a job interview in Sydney with a job offer and he shows reluctance thinking that things here are as they are in Sudan and he will not get the job because "he didn't show enthusiasm".


"It is essential to ask with politeness when seeking help and it is essential to say thank you".

This is also something taken for granted here.

With a poor English vocabulary, a new Sudanese migrant ends up in an office seeking help, saying "I want so and so…" instead of "I need so and so.." and the person behind the desk mumbles to himself "who the hell is he to tell me what he wants…., he is the one in need here".

It never occurs to his mind that it is the poverty, the cultural differences and the English vocabulary that are causing this tension and it doesn't occur to the migrant mind that he has just been rude with someone. The next time he ends up there, he doesn't get served well and he starts saying "this guy is racist".

Or, if he went to another place, got served well and left without saying thank you, the person behind the desk would murmur "what is wrong with him". In Sudan, we believe that every person does his duty and you don't need to say thank you at all. If the migrant ended up in the same place with the same person, he would not get good service because of last time's rudeness. The migrant would conclude that "this guy is racist" and he might start to be paranoid or victimize himself.


"Personal initiative and personal achievements are important in work places for both the employer and the employee"

This is not the case in Sudan; you stick to what you are told to do regardless of everything because your personal initiative will cause you to be unemployed.

A new migrant may end up working in an environment that requires initiative. If he just sits there staring at the others, he will get fired for his lack of initiative and he will start to believe, at least, that they hate him.


"Happiness and satisfaction are connected to planning and achieving personal success. Be different, let your individuality shine. Seek your personal goals".

In Sudan, we believe, happiness is connected to harmonizing with the desires and the expectations of family, clan or the group you belong to. A Sudanese proverb says "the wolf eats the strayed goats". A Chinese proverb says "the pig that goes away from the group, get battered". The text in the western picture books for kids read "john goes…. He swims ….he plays …he jumps…etc" While the text in the Chinese picture books read "the big brother helps the little brother…..he helps him swim and jump".

In other words individuality is discouraged.


"Everyone should comply with the rules and the regulations regardless of his personal characteristics or his relation with influential people"

This is not the case in Sudan either, there are many exceptions. In the Japanese language, the word you use to refer to yourself when addressing your boss is different than that you use to address your father or friends. You use a different word when referring to yourself each time you address a person of a different stature.


"It is Ok to speak about your self and show your strong characteristics when asked to do so".

It is not Ok to do that in my culture.

A new migrant might end up in a job interview and when asked to speak about himself he might not respond properly and show them his 'can do' attitude. Consequently, he might not get the job and he might think that he didn't get the job because the guys are racist.


"The stature of the person should be based on his achievements not on other things like his belonging to a particular ethnic group".

This is the case in western culture only, not in other places.


Other things taken for granted here, like going to a job interview neat and wearing a suit, are not taken for granted among new arrivals.


These are some of the shards of how the cultural differences can impact on a new migrant from Africa. If we keep in mind that Australia is bringing people of low-literacy levels from the refugee camps, how many of them will be able to figure it out for themselves and get themselves jobs that keep them away from get-rich-quick schemes or from hanging out looking for something to do. Even if the migrant becomes aware of it, sometimes it is so ingrained in him to the extent that he behaves automatically. You don't expect such difficulties with Serbian and Albanian new settlers, for example, because they share the same values to some extent.


These little things cause job opportunities to slip away and consequently new arrivals have a lot of time with nothing to do. Since it is difficult for them to find out why some job opportunities slip away from them, they find themselves ending up in segregated social gatherings with people who have had similar experiences. Then victimization starts to build inside the community and you start to hear claims about alleged racist attitudes.

The young boys, who have nothing to do, end up gambling, drinking or hanging out at the train stations harassing people. Consequently they end up in trouble with police officers. If we keep in mind that most Sudanese have problems with authority figures and people in uniforms, then its no surprise to find examples of over policing situations, because police officers, who have seen small problems escalating into big ones with no clear reason, will end up over policing any encounter with a young Sudanese. These are situations that reflect what can only be called racist attitudes.


Youth who belong to large families who haven't received adequate housing yet, escape the small rooms they share with their siblings to the streets hanging out with fellows who have the same problems. "In most the cases, they struggle at schools because they only have nine months to learn English before being put in class of their age rather than their abilities" said a community member to the editor of Sunday Herald sun (Melbourne).


For the older community members, things are as they were for the first generation settlers from other communities. The Australian post World War II migration experience says that, large numbers of the first generation settlers never reach the sufficient advanced proficiency in English which would enable them to cope in complex situations of contact. So, why is it a problem when it is about Sudanese and Africans and it is not a big fuss with the Greek and the Italians?


The second reason the migration Minster has given us for his decision was that "They are forming racial gangs and attacking people in Victoria"

Victoria has about 18 thousand Sudanese settlers, forming the largest Sudanese community in Australia. There are 30,000 Africans in NSW; 13,000 of them are Sudanese. The Sunday Herald Sun (Melbourne) surveyed 400 cases at the magistrate court across Melbourne and found that 14 percent of the offenders came from the Horn of Africa and the Middle East, many of them are refugees. They represent about 20 times the representative proportion of the population. In other words, the 14 percent represent Sudanese, Somalians, Ethiopians, Eritrean, Lebanese, Iraqis and other small Middle East settlers. If you have 18,000 persons, you can expect that, at least, 100 of them will be with criminal tendencies, that is the natural selection of things. If we analyzed the survey we will find that 86% of the offenders are Australians, 14% are from migrant backgrounds.


Hakeem Hakeem, a 21 year old boy was sentenced for 24 years in prison for raping two teenage girls and an elderly woman in a drunken, drug-fuelled episode. He committed these crimes only one month after he arrived in Australia.


The other alleged offenses committed by Sudanese are some cases of drink-driving. Any objective look at the case will tell you that drink-driving has always been an issue everywhere in Australia. You don't need to be a Sudanese or black African to commit that. Ask the RTA.


In many cases we have noticed the tendency of overexposing and exaggerating the offences committed by Africans in general and Sudanese in particular. A case of speeding in Tamworth city was overexposed and used as a plea to kick out five Sudanese families from the area. Without the government and the Anglican Church support, they could have been kicked out. A fight involving intoxicated Sudanese at a night club was overexposed by channel 7 to ruin the young profile of the Sudanese community. It was presented in a way as if this was the first time in Australia's history that drunken people had fought each other in a night club. A friend of mine who works as a security guard in a shopping centre told me that, as a security guard, he encountered many cases of shop lifting committed by non-Africans. When he caught an African man in a shop lifting case, the case was overexposed to the extent that they are still talking about until now.


On the other hand, attacks and offenses committed against us have been either totally ignored or underexposed. In this case it not just about Africans, but about the Middle Easterners as well. When two Australian men were imprisoned in United Arab Emirates for accusations of sexual harassment of a flight attendant, the Australian media exposed the issue in a way which suggested that they were just "two decent men caught in a bad service –long flight situation" and highlighted the alleged "bad service" of the airline. If the accused men had been Arabs or Africans travelling on an Australian airline, make no mistake that the issue would have been used to highlight the alleged "ingrained sexual abuse of women in the Arab culture" or "the savage sexual drives of the Africans".

The accused men would have been banned from entering Australia before even pleading guilty and the Prime Minister and the Opposition leader would have made some comments about the issue. It is hard to swallow but this the ugly truth.

When a Danish editor published a collection of cartoons about prophet Mohamed drawn by Danish cartoonists, there was an outraged reaction across the Islamic world saying "Islam is being mocked". Some of Australia's main stream media supported the cartoonists and their fundmental rights of self expression saying that it is art and should not be interpreted in any other way. In late August this year, when two pieces of art, a statue of the Virgin Mary shrouded in a Muslim Burqa and a holographic image of Ossam bin ladin that morphs into Jesus Christ were submitted for consideration in the Blake prize, the Daily Telegraph came out saying "Christianity is mocked again".

So, it is Art when Prophet Mohamed is drawn and it is insult when it comes to Christ. Any paranoid radical Islamic Fundamentalist can use it to radicalize Muslim youth.


Before 1971, I would not have been allowed to immigrate to Australia simply because I am black and that was "the white Australia policy" in its broadest sense. But the Australians decided to give up their white paradise and open it to the others. Thanks to the 1967 referendum which lifted the Aboriginals from subhuman beings who couldn't vote to full citizens participating in their country and paved the way to the abolition of the white Australia policy for ever. Now, in less than forty years, Australia has been transformed from a predominantly Anglo-Saxon society to a society of 200 ancestries speaking more than 200 languages. Centrelink, Australia's government welfare system, receives 28 million calls each year and the Centerlink language service offers 400 000 interpreting jobs yearly for interpreters speaking more than 200 languages; actually 23 percent of Australians were born overseas. It is the giant leap that transformed Australia from a secluded white paradise colony in the heart of the pacific, to a multicultural first world nation which proudly take its share of international responsibilities. I came to Australia as part of the 13, 000 annual refugee intake Australia committed itself to as part of its international responsibilities.


The white paradise is gone, but to a minority of people, it is still lingering.


Following the article by the Macquarie University professor, a minority of six people protested several times in Blacktown area demanding the government to stop bringing Sudanese and Somali refugees because, as the group claimed, they "brought diseases to Australia", "violent and rapists (have savage sexual drive)", "stupid and have low IQ test results". Recently, the group extended its activities to another level and distributed flyers in the mail boxes in some areas of western Sydney. Adding to the situation is the lack of accurate information about the issues, like health, from the government agencies, the young profile of African migrants, the ingrained prejudice and stereotype about Black people descending from the colonial era, the already ruined reputation of Africans in Australia by the mainstream media and talkback radio programs, and the absence of a united African community that can tackle such claims by reason. The situation has the potential to be aggravated to serious levels.


When the Greek, Italians, Maltese and other settlers migrated to Australia, they were called "wogs" and "wackos". When a large numbers of Asians started to migrate to Australia in the early eighties, the same group protesting now against Sudanese and Africans, protested and said "Asians can not integrated into our system and can not understand our culture". After September 11, Arabs and Muslims started to take the slug. And now it is the turn of Africans. The problem is that there is none else behind to take it from us later. Pretty tough situation, mate.


To be fair, social psychology says that foreigners with strange accents and wired behaviors have always been hated wherever they go. Every human society does that in some way or another. In Sudan, many people will not hesitate to remind you that you are a foreigner if you cross some lines.

Psychologists explain this, saying that it is because "people feel they can trust and understand others because of shared language, religion and culture". People see threads coming from those who speak different languages and have a different culture rather than from those they share a language and culture with. Every new migrant knows that "if you have an Australian accent, you have a bullet proof vest" in other words "if you have an Australian accent, your arse is safe". That is the way Australians express their patriotism if you like. Any migrant who travelled overseas and gets back will know that as soon as the airport officers hear his Australian accent, the treatment will significantly change.

What this group is protesting about is not an understandable form of patriotism or legitimate concerns over the health or the safety of their families. The things they are claiming, which go back to the heritage of a lingering colonial mind, haven't been done away with yet, though it has been half a century now.



"They brought diseases to Australia"

Sudanese refugees in Cairo who smoked more 20 cigarettes a day stopped smoking if they were called for an appointment in the Australian embassy. Usually the Australians call a month before the interview. The migrants stop smoking precisely because if their applications were approved, they have to undergo a comprehensive blood test and a tough radiology chest test. If any suspicious thing appeared in their radiology test, samples would be sent to Australia and the refugee would have to wait for another two months at least. The toughness of the Australian embassy medical check forces them to quit smoking for at least for two months. Some of them quit forever. Under any circumstances, there is no way that a refugee can travel to Australia if he has any kind of disease that could be detected by checking his blood or by chest radiology.


"They are violent and rapists (have savage sexual drive)"

Anthropologists who carefully studied and lived among the so called primitive tribes, concluded that unlike what we are taught to believe about primitive tribes, primitive man is not violent at all. They say "when primitive man formed his first riding party; it wasn't to kill and burn, but to take a few captives to sacrifice for their gods and for ritual cannibalism". Fighting and war for primitive man takes a form of a sports competition rather than annihilation. Some Anthropologists reported that "some of the red Indians shared their gun powder with their American enemies before the battle; some of the Australian Aboriginals gave their unarmed British enemies weapons before the battle, while others sent food to their hungry enemies to make the fighting fair". In other words, the likeliness of war has grown in proportion to what we call civilization. Ritual cannibalism is associated with primitive man, while annihilation is associated with modern man. Can you imagine how many British men the Aborigines have killed with their spears compared to the annihilation the British, with their machine guns, have committed.

Despite that the Aboriginal people were classified as violent and accordingly annihilated, while the British settlers, with their mass killing guns, were the peaceful and civilized humans. The Australian Aboriginals are the most imprisoned race in the world; the Maori of New Zealand are the second most imprisoned race in the world. It is no surprise that Australia and New Zealand have opposed the recent UN Convention about the indigenous people rights. As a character in the Australian Drama The Circus says "Show me one Black man who hasn't got a record".


By 1900 the Victorian Empire upon which the sun never set included 11 million square miles and 390 million people. How many millions had the British killed in order to build this Empire? In one night in 1895, the British annihilated 100 000 Sudanese in Karari using their fast gun machines. What happened in Sudan happened in every British colony over the world. The British alone are responsible for the annihilation of several million people in Africa and Asia in order to set their "Great Britain". The same thing applies to the French, the Spanish in South America and all the other European nations. The west won the world not by the superiority of its ideas, values or humanity, but by the mass killing machine- guns they invented.

In other words, the modern European man is the most violent creature that has ever walked on the face of the earth.

Accusing Africans and the other nonwestern societies of Barbarism had always been an active way of reducing them to subhuman beings and thus legalizing killing them without holding any responsibility. Psychologists say that the first step towards committing a crime is reducing the victim to subhuman beings. Another step of committing a crime is transforming an awful thing into a noble duty. That is what Rudyard Kipling, the man who coined "the white man's burden" did. By coining that, he transformed the horrors of colonization into a noble duty.


Further more, criminologists say that the phenomenon of serial killers, those who kill for the pleasure of killing, seems to be associated with the western culture only. In Africa and other places, (x) kills (y) for specific reason like taking his money, his wife or for vendetta, but not for the sake of killing itself or for the sake of "the perfect crime"


Accusing us of being violent is a projection, a way of getting rid of the harsh reality that the modern European man is most violent creature nature has ever seen. When Gengis Khan invaded Asia, and Hannibal invaded Europe, the rule of the world was that you either invade or wait for someone to invade your kingdom; you either destroy them or wait for them to destroy you. There was no universal culture of mercy and humanity. But when colonization reached its highest peak in the 20 th century, the Enlightenment thoughts had prevailed and Europe started to project an image of itself as a civilization of mercy, forgiveness and humanity. But the fact is that the west won the world only by the maxim of machine- guns and Remington rifles. Despite all the preaching and the humanity portrayed in the books, they went out, annihilated the indigenous tribes, conquered their lands and subjected them to the meanest forms of dehumanization. Genghis Khan and Hannibal had never shown off saying that they were merciful humanitarians, the west did.


Before colonization there were the acquisition and crusade periods. Compare what happened during these periods to anything that happened elsewhere in the world.


There are 30 000 Africans in NSW; 13 000 of them are Sudanese; we didn't hear any cases of rape. There are 18 000 Sudanese in Victoria and thousands of other Africans, the only case of rape was that of a drunken 21 man who committed it just one month after he arrived in Australia. There are thousands of Africans and Sudanese in Queensland, Tasmania and Western Australia, we haven't heard about the rapes and the attacks you are talking about.

You have no legitimate concerns over health and safety to worry about at any level.




"They are stupid and have low IQ test results".

"I know perfectly well that in a scientific sense there is no such thing as race. But I as a politician need a concept which enables the order, which has hitherto existed on historic bases to be abolished and an entirely new and antihistoric order enforced and given an intellectual basis….and for this purpose the concept of race serves me well."

Adolph Hitler


"Race has no biological reality. The human species simply does not come packaged that way. Race is social, cultural and political concept based on superficial appearances and historical conditions"

Jonathan Marks, Professor from Yale University.


Our nomadic Homo-sapiens and Homo-eructs ancestors migrated from Africa to inhabit the rest of the world millions of years ago. The differences in the color of skin do not imply anything more than the way they adapted to the environment they inhabited. The DNA analysis dismantled any idea of race completely. We share 99.44% of our DNA with the Apes and 50% of our DNA with the worms. Some scientists claim that Apes should be entitled to all human rights.

To say this person is stupid because he is black and this person is intelligent because he is white is simply mumbo-jumbo; it does not mean any thing at all. But guess what, the English dictionary defines white as: pure, innocent, ardent and passionate, while defines black as: soiled, dirty, wicked, evil, dismal, gloomy and sullen. Structuralism says that the languages shape the way people think. This what people want to believe their whiteness implies, and this what they want the blackness of others imply. This argument belongs to the 19 th century; it doesn't even belong to the 21st century at all.


In regard to the Education and the IQ tests, there are two decisive elements which contribute to the whole outcome of achieving a high IQ score: nutrition and the means to education (from professional teachers to an appropriate environment for study to help with homework). A malnourished African kid, who has spent years in the refugee camps, will not compete with an Australian kid who has good nutrition, good teachers, well educated parents, Kids TV programs (Sesame Street and Blues Clues) in addition to attendance in professional childcare and play-class- rooms at the age of four.

A newly migrated mother, who does not speak English, can not call the local library to get someone to help her kid who is stuck with his homework. The kid tries his best and then, the next morning his homework paper looks very stupid. The possibilities are endless.

Despite all the difficulties, Sudanese refugee kids have achieved high academic performance across Australia: Zaki Tahir Malik, a Sudanese teenage achieved overall 98.98% in the secondary school examination in South Australia. He won a scholarship to study medicine at Adelaide University, the Lord Floury prize from the Ministry of Education and Training and the prize of the Physics Institute in Adelaide. Amal Abbas Mukhtar, a Sudanese teenage girl, achieved overall of 92.75% in NSW's secondary school examination in Sydney Amal received a prize from Jackie Kelly, the federal MP of Penrith.


While all these things were taking place, the wise men of the community have always managed to alleviate what was going on saying "our presence is Australia is young and its just normal that sometimes people overreact to new things", "these are attitudes of minority of people and do not represent in anyway the main stream Australia in any way", "the Australians are in a process of transformation and so are we, it will take sometime" and "we have the government support and understanding". But now it is pretty clear to us that the government stands on the other side.


This article is not an appeal to Kevin Andrews or the government because they know where they are standing and why, this article is an appeal to the strong sense of fairness and justice in the Australians. This sense of fairness that we know and that the world has witnessed was seen in the case of Dr. Haneef. This strong sense of fairness and justice was what made the 1967 referendum possible, abolished the white Australian policy for ever and put Australia in the first row of the world's Multicultural Nations. Until this fairness and justice prevail, and it will, we will enjoy our short shrift.


…………………………………………………..

Mohamed Husein Hasabrabo is a former Journalist and editorial cartoonist.

He is the author of a novel in English (due to published in the US) and a play.

He was born in Dar Fur, Sudan in 1977.



References

SUDAN REVIEW, tail edition February 2007, founded by Bernard Suwa (B.A., M Phil) and quotations from Sunday Herald Sun (Melbourne) quoted in article by the editor..
The daily telegraph, August 30, 2007.
Report of the community Relations Commission for Multicultural NSW, Investigation into African Humanitarian settlement in NSW, June 2006
Centrelik Information, a guide to payments and services 2005-06
Papers from FACC NATIONAL CONFERENCE, working collaboratively towards full participation, November 17 – 18 2005 Mercure Sydney Airport.
The new Merriam- Webster dictionary
Understanding Media: the extension of man by Marshall Mcluhan.
The clash of civilizations and the remaking of world order, Samuel P. Huntington.
A violent history of man, Colin Wilson.
The meaning of things, applying philosophy to life, A.C. Grayling
The geography of thought, How Asian and Westerners think, Richard E Nibett
The end of man and the consequences of the biotechnological revolution, Francis Fukuyama.
Internet resources. And general readings.