White-minded

Jun 8 2008 by Pauline Holt, Sunday Sun

THIS week, the Democratic Party in the US has a black man as its presumptive presidential nominee — the first black candidate from a major party — while Gordon Brown’s cabinet remains all white. PAULINE HOLT got the views of Hartlepool doctor Nadeem Siddiqui, an orthodox Muslim, on whether we will ever have our own Barack Obama.

HARTLEPOOL is not recognised for its racial diversity.

The last census indicates that 98.9 per cent of its population is white with all other ethnic groups accounting for the remaining 1.2 per cent, or 1030 people.

Dr Nadeem Siddiqui is one of the 0.4pc of Muslims who live there, and you might be forgiven for thinking he’s come across a fair bit of prejudice.Yet you’d be wrong.

Dr Siddiqui, 36, has lived on Teesside for almost seven years and has yet to experience any problems.

He said: “It’s fantastic here. I haven’t encountered any form of discrimination whatsoever.

“Certainly in my workplace I have encountered zero problems, not even a hint of it.”

A tribute to our region indeed, particularly as he came to work in the North for an out-of-hours emergency medical surgery in September 2001 . . . the time of the attacks on the World Trade Center.

With his full beard, a requirement of his faith, Dr Siddiqui says he did attract stares but found it understandable.

He said: “That was a very worrying time. But if the same were to happen outside a civilised democracy there would have been lynching or at least mass rioting.

“I felt safe. I knew I could call the police if I had to and could voice my opinion and that’s something you won’t get anywhere else.

“England is a very accommodating country. It respects other people’s views.”

But he says there’s a long way to go before we have the possibility of a black political leader like Barack Obama, who this week moved a step closer to becoming US President.

“We are far off, but I don’t think that’s due to the way we treat ethnic minorities. I think a lot is to do with the ethnic minorities themselves. I have worked hard and I have been rewarded.

“A black Prime Minister here? I think it can happen but I think ethnic minorities need to prove themselves as well.”

Dr Siddiqui was brought up by Indian parents in Newham in London’s East End, one of the most deprived boroughs in the country, and went to his local comprehensive.

He wanted to be a doctor from an early age, but at first struggled academically. Encouraged by his mother, a former headmistress in India, he persevered and also found a strong faith on a pilgrimage to Mecca.

He said: “I worked hard and prayed hard.”

After gaining ‘A’ grades in all his exams he won a place at Emmanuel College, Cambridge to study medicine.

Dr Siddiqui smiled: “It was my little miracle.”

Six years ago this month he was introduced to his wife, Katrina Spears (a distant relative of pop star Britney) by an Imam in California.

They married the day after they first met face to face and now have two beautiful children, daughter Hayaat Rose, aged four, and son, Hasan, aged two.

Katrina, 30, converted to Islam at 19 and wed Nadeem against her Evangelical Christian mother’s wishes.

But husband and mum-in-law are now the best of friends and it was Dr Siddiqui she chose to give her away when she herself married last year.

In his view, you make your own luck and what needs to happen if there is ever to be a black PM is for people to stop using colour as an excuse.

“I heard a black guy on the radio who said he was an assistant chief exec of the fire brigade, but couldn’t get to chief exec due to his colour.

“But to get to assistant chief exec is no mean feat. I can understand why the English community get a bit narked. Ethnic minorities need to work hard and engage.”

And Dr Siddiqui says he may one day enter politics himself. “I may have political aspirations though I’m a bit busy with my career at the moment.”

Maybe too late for PM then, but could he one day be Hartlepool’s first black MP or Mayor? Iain Wright and Stuart Drummond should look to their laurels!