Paul Arhewe,
(With Agency Reports)
The 2010 United Kingdom general elections made history as the numbers of foreigners who vied for seats in British parliament was unprecedented. Out of the 4,149 candidates battling to secure seats in the parliament, 315 of them were independent candidates. 89 Asians partook as candidates in the poll while Africans from Ghana, South Africa, Uganda and Nigeria were among the hundreds that vied in the election.
Three out of the five Nigerians that contested in the election won parliamentary seats in different constituencies, while the forth gave a hot contention for her constituency.
Helen Grant a 48-year old attorney, whose father is a Nigerian and has a Briton mother and the Conservative Party's parliamentary candidate, faced hostility after surviving controversy in 2009 when it emerged she was once a member of the Labour Party.
Grant born in London became the Conservative Party's first black female Member of Parliament for the mostly white, rural, and staunchly Conservative district of Maidstone & The Weald of Kent. She was chosen by Conservative Party leader David Cameron to succeed Ann Widdecombe, who is retiring. Ms. Grant is running on a platform of reforming Maidstone Hospital, defeating Kent International Gateway “to protect our beautiful Kent countryside from predatory developers”, and emphasizing local suppliers and producers.
She secured the seat for Maidstone and the Weald constituency with 23,491 votes (48 per cent), beating second and third runner ups Peter Carroll of Liberal democrat who garnered 17,602 votes (36.0 per cent) and Rav Seeruthun of Labour with 4,769 (9.7 per cent).
Conservative Party activists who complain that the A-lister was "foisted" on them by the party's leadership predicted that some local Tories will not campaign for her but will instead help Tory candidates in neighbouring seats. Donal Blaney, a Tory activist and blogger, said: "There are a number of people in the association, activists who go out in the pouring rain, that are upset and a lot of them have said they will not campaign to help Helen. They will help Greg Clark or Damian Green, people who have a track record as Conservatives. "Parachuting people into safe seats and imposing them is a disservice to activists. Part of the bitterness that has arisen over Liz Truss [a candidate whom many Tory activists oppose on their A-list, because she had an affair with a married Tory MP while she was married] and Helen Grant is that activists have been labelled the 'Turnip Taliban' when they are the people who have kept the Tory party afloat and are now being denigrated."
Grant first emerged on Booker Rising’s radar screen in 2008. The Maidstone & the Weald seat is the Conservative Party’s 10th safest district. I.e., barring a massive catastrophe, expect to see her in Parliament this year. There have been minor complaints from local activists that she is “insufficiently Conservative” (because she was once a Labour Party member, she’s only been a Conservative Party member for four years, and some local activists didn’t like that she made the A-list so quickly), but nothing serious. She was inspired to become a Tory by Mr. Cameron.
Grant was raised by her single mother on the Raffles council estate in Carlisle ("council estates" are called public housing projects in America) without a car or a television. She later became captain of her school tennis and hockey teams, and also did track & field and cross-country. Ms. Grant is a former under-16 Judo Champion in North of England and Southern Scotland.
Grant later obtained a law degree at the University of Hull, undertook solicitors' finals at the College of Law in Guildford and qualified as a solicitor in 1988. Her law experience lies in family law and health care. She is now Senior Partner at Grants Solicitors LLP, Croydon, where she has been since 1996. She is also the founder of Grants Solicitors, a specialist firm focused on solving family breakdown.
Responding to a question about why she wants to enter politics, she said: "I have always had strong views and I have always fought for what I believed in. I believe in individual freedom combined with personal responsibilities, free enterprise and a non-interfering state. I have also always felt strongly about being compassionate toward other people and have held firm opinions on issues surrounding families, women, social justice and social mobility, probably because of my work and my personal background. My party political awakening came in 2004. My children were no longer babies and were becoming more independent, my business had started to mature, with a good management team in place, and I was ready for a new challenge where I might be able to continue helping other people both as individuals but also on a broader scale. Politics seemed to be the obvious route. I had a brief flirtation with the Labour Party because at the time they were holding themselves out as the champions of social justice, which was important to me, but I quickly realised that they were not. Moreover they were failing to deal with the aspirations of normal people in our country. When David Cameron became leader of the Conservative party in December 2005 I was instantly attracted and inspired by his views on all of the above issues and I joined the Conservative party shortly after, in January 2006."
Now a wealthy woman due to her law practice, Ms. Grant is married and has two teenage children. She has lived in Surrey, England since 1994 and enjoys tennis, movies, major sporting events, and family life. She is a member of the Conservative Party Family Law Reform Commission, the National Advisory Group for Domestic Violence, and the Society for Conservative Lawyers.
Grant would join MP Adam Afriyie and Lord John Taylor as black Conservatives in Parliament as the emerged victorious.
Another Nigerian who pulled a big win in the UK 2010 poll is Chuka Ummuna. He contested under the Labour Party, won the constituency seat for Streatham with 20,037 votes (42.8 per cent), beating Chris Nicholson of Liberal Democrat with 16,778 votes (35.8 percent), Rahoul Bhansali of Conservative with 8,578 votes (18.3 percent), Rebecca Findlay of Green Party with 861 votes (1.8 per cent), and Geoffrey Macharia of Christian Party with 237 votes (0.5 per cent).
Ummuna who was born and bred in Steatham is well known in his community and sometimes referred to as ‘the UK Obama’.
Prior to becoming Labour’s parliamentary candidate in Streatham, Ummuna was Vice Chair of Streatham Labour Party from 2004 to 2008 and had held a variety of positions throughout the local party. He is a member of the GMB and Unite trade unions and sits on the Management Committee of progressive pressure group, Compass
“I know our party will do everything we can for the residents of this fantastic place”, Ummuna said after emerging victorious on Friday.
In March 2008 Umunna was selected by the Streatham Labour Party as its parliamentary candidate at the next General Election. He succeeds Keith Hill, the current Labour Member of Parliament who has held the seat since April 1992 and is to retire.
He has lived in the Streatham parliamentary constituency all his life (save for a short stint away studying). In his formative years Umunna attended Christ Church Primary School in the Brixton Hill part of the constituency and he is presently a School Governor of Sunnyhill Primary School and sits on the Board of Sunnyhill Children’s Centre, both in Streatham Wells. He lives on Streatham High Road.
Umunna is a specialist employment law solicitor by profession and works at a Central London law firm where he primarily acts for employees but also employers. In addition, he sits on the Board of Generation Next, a not for profit social enterprise which provides activities for young people in London, and has been involved charitable youth work in Lambeth too.
Prior to becoming Labour’s parliamentary candidate in Streatham, Umunna was Vice Chair of Streatham Labour Party from 2004 to 2008 and had held a variety of positions throughout the local party. He is a member of the GMB and Unite trade unions and sits on the Management Committee of progressive pressure group, Compass.
As a person of mixed Nigerian, Irish and English descent, Umunna would become the first person of Black parentage to represent one of the three parliamentary constituencies covering the Brixton area. Aged 30, Umunna also become one of the youngest MPs in the country.
Commenting in March 2008 on his selection as Labour’s parliamentary candidate in Streatham, Umunna said “Streatham is my home – I grew up here – so it is a great privilege to have been selected as Labour’s next Prospective Parliamentary Candidate in this constituency.
“Labour has achieved a lot and this country is a far better place to live than it was in 1997 with unemployment in Streatham down from 10.2 percent then, to 5.2 percent now, but we still have lots of work to do.
“I am very grateful to Labour Party members for selecting me to succeed Keith Hill, who has been a fantastic MP for Streatham, and I relish the prospect of getting out and about and taking our message to the community with him between now and the next general election.”
Local residents welcomed Umunna’s selection as Labour’s parliamentary candidate. The Rev. Lisa Wright, retired curate at St Leonard’s Church, Streatham, said:
“Myself and Chuka’s family were members of St Margaret’s Church in Streatham for many years. I think he would make a wonderful MP for the area and the fact that he is a local boy will definitely appeal to the people here. He is part of the new generation in this new political era!”
Richard Guy, a local firefighter from Streatham said:
“Chuka is a childhood friend – we both grew up in Streatham together. I remember how proud he was of me when I became a firefighter – his admiration for those (like me) working in our public services to keep this country functioning is unswerving
Also, Chi Onwurah, another Nigerian won the Newcastle Central seat under the Labour party flagship. Onwurah secured the parliamentary seat with 15,692 votes (45.9 percent), beating Gareth Kane of Liberal Democrat with 8,228 votes (24.1 percent), and Nick Holder of Conservative with 6,611 votes (19.4 percent).
Onwurah was born in Wallsend in 1965, grew up on Hillsview Avenue in Kenton and went to Kenton School before studying Electrical Engineering in London. She lived in many different cities around the world, always remember Newcastle where she was brought up. Her maternal grandfather was a sheet metal worker in the shipyards of the Tyne during the depression. Her mother grew up in poverty in Garth Heads on the quayside. In the fifties she married a Nigerian student at Newcastle Medical School. Her father practiced dentistry in Gosforth. She said in her profile “I was still a baby when my father took us to live in Awka, Nigeria. But two years later the Biafran Civil War broke out bringing famine with it and, as described vividly in an Evening Chronicle article in 1968, my mother, my brother and sister and I returned as refugees to Newcastle, whilst my father stayed on in the Biafran army”.
Two Nigerians, Abiodun Akinoshun and Kemi Adegoke lost to other candidates in the polls. While Adegoke put up a good fight by clinching 22.2 per cent (10,684) of the votes in her constituency, Akinoshun got the worst result with 438. Akinoshun contested for the Erith and Thamesmead parliamentary seat as an independent candidate. He got 438 votes, losing to Labour candidate, Teresa Pearce who got 19,068 votes. Adegoke contested under the flagship of Conservative Party for the Dulwich and West Norwood parliamentary seat. She lost to Labour candidate Tessa Jowell who scored 22,461 votes (46.6 per cent).
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