Salma Yaqoob

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Salma Yaqoob

Salma Yaqoob (b. 1971) is the vice-chair of RESPECT The Unity Coalition and a Birmingham City Councillor. She is also is the head of the Birmingham Stop the War Coalition and a spokesperson for Birmingham Central Mosque.

1 Background
2 Activism
3 Politics
4 References
5 Articles
6 External links

[edit] Background

She was born in Bradford, England to Pakistani parents and grew up in Birmingham. She is a trauma psychotherapist by profession. She is married to a general practitioner and has three children. She is to date the only female representative of a mosque in the United Kingdom.

[edit] Activism

In her youth she was concerned about the treatment of women in countries such as Pakistan, and even considered converting to Christianity. However she concluded that the Qur'an gave women more rights than the Christian Bible, and began wearing the hijab at 18. (source: Islam Unveiled article below)

Yaqoob became an anti-war campaigner after being spat at in the street shortly after the September 11, 2001 attacks and attending an anti-war meeting at which she was struck by hearing non-Muslims voice concerns about the upcoming war on Afghanistan. It has been suggested that she played a crucial role in inviting Muslims into an anti-war movement previously dominated by Marxists. She has argued against the idea, put forward by what she calls religious fundamentalists and sectarian right-wingers, that Muslims and non-Muslims cannot work together, as well as against what she claims are calls for Muslims to "keep their heads down" from within the Muslim community.

Yaqoob had very little experience of politics prior to September 11 although she had been involved in the 'Justice for the Yemen Seven' campaign after her family became embroiled in the proceedings. This campaign was to support seven (later, eight) British Muslims who were accused by the Yemeni authorities of terrorist activities in its capital Sana'a during Christmas. Protests and lobbying in Britain eventually resulted in release of most of the British suspects.

[edit] Politics

In the 2005 general election, she stood as the Respect candidate for the Birmingham Sparkbrook and Small Heath constituency against Labour's Roger Godsiff MP, with the backing of the Muslim Association of Britain. She finished in second place, ahead of the Liberal Democrat and Conservative candidates, and with 27.5% of the total vote. During the campaign, Yaqoob had faced harassment and death threats from al Ghurabaa, a takfiri Islamist terrorism organization banned under Terrorism Act 2006. Al-Ghurabaa claimed that it is an act of apostasy for Muslims to participate in Western democratic elections. Al-Ghurabaa members defaced her election posters with the word 'Kafir.'

Yaqoob was elected with 49.4% of the vote in the Sparkbrook ward of Birmingham City Council in the 2006 UK local elections. She claimed that her election "challenged the traditional conservatism that denies leading public positions to women, and challenged the old order, which treats our communities as silent voting fodder. And it was only possible because we united people around a progressive message of anti-racism and social justice."[1]