Faizel Patel, 2016-05-06
The British Labour Party’s Sadiq Khan has reportedly won the London mayoral elections, becoming the first Muslim to do so in a major European capital.
According to RT, the British-Pakistani MP for Tooting was 9 points ahead of his Conservative rival Zac Goldsmith with counting almost over.
Goldsmith’s campaign has been marked by accusations of being “dirty” and “negative”, including from within his own party, for its emphasis on Khan’s ties to alleged extremists.
Critics have accused Goldsmith of attacking Khan on the basis of his Muslim faith and labelled his campaign racist, a claim he denies.
Khan, who calls himself “the British Muslim who will take the fight to the extremists”, accused Goldsmith of trying to scare and divide voters in a proudly multicultural city of 8.6 million people, more than 1 million of them Muslims.
He is now widely seen as the most powerful Muslim in Britain, with a budget of £17 billion to spend on the capital for policing, transport, planning and the environment.
The expected-mayor of the UK’s capital is the son of immigrants from Pakistan who settled in London in the 1960s, where his father worked as a bus driver.
Supporters of Khan have already begun tweeting congratulations to the new mayor.
– Agencies
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