How weird is life! On the same month that anonymous letters were sent out across several communities in the UK, declaring April 3rd as “Punish a Muslim” day, a Muslim gets appointed as the Interior Minister/Home Secretary of Britain!
Today, UK Prime Minister Theresa May named Sajid Javid as Britain’s first-ever Home Secretary with an ethnic minority background. A high profile position widely recognised as one of the most prestigious and important roles in the British Cabinet.
That’s a great achievement for Javid, and for ethnic minority communities in Britain, but to everyone’s surprise this is not Javid’s only big achievement. He had a very challenging life, where he had risen from poverty to the front bench!
Sajid Javid grew up in a rundown part of Bristol, known as ‘Britain’s most dangerous street’. He is the son of a Pakistani immigrant, a bus driver, who raised his family of seven in a two-bedroom flat above a shop.
“No one’s going to give you anything: you’ve got to go out there and earn it.” Quoting Javid.
By the time Javid was first elected as the Member of the Parliament for Bromsgrove in 2010, he was already a successful investment banker, earning a reputed £3m a year, and running the Asian trading division of Deutsche Bank.
Soon after joining the parliament, he became a protégé of then-chancellor George Osborne, who gave him a succession of ministerial jobs, including parliamentary private secretary, junior Treasury Minister, City Minister, Culture Secretary and eventually Business Secretary.
After the resignation of Amber Rudd for having misled lawmakers over deportation targets for illegal immigrants, and appointing Javid as new Home Secretary, all eyes are on Javid now. His first task will be to take some of the political heat out of the Windrush scandal.
“Making sure that we have an immigration policy that is fair, treats people with respect and with decency – that will be one of my most urgent tasks,” he told reporters.
We wish him best of luck.
