A Muslim woman who escaped war-torn Lebanon has possibly become Australia’s first councillor to wear a hijab.
Nadia Saleh wore a light-purple head covering on Saturday night as she declared victory in the race for Canterbury-Bankstown council, in Sydney’s multicultural south-west.
The mother-of-four, who runs a community centre, was one of three Muslim candidates who were elected to the Roselands ward.
Nadia Saleh declares victory in the Roselands ward as possibly the first councillor in a hijab as senior federal Labor frontbencher Tony Burke looks on (second, left)
In an historic first, all Roselands’ new councillors are Muslim, including her Labor running mate Mohammad Huda and Liberal candidate Mohammad Zaman.
Another Muslim Labor candidate, Bilal El-Hayek, was also elected in the Bankstown ward.
Mrs Saleh’s victory in the New South Wales local government election comes 28 years after she was almost killed fleeing Lebanon’s civil war to join her husband Khodr, who had been in Sydney for three years.
After settling in Sydney’s south-west, she dedicated herself to her newly adopted community, becoming a manager of the Riverwood Community Centre.
‘When I first arrived at Australia, I struggled to raise my kids. I struggled to ask for support,’ she told SBS program Once Upon A Time in Punchbowl in 2014, in which she did not wear a hijab.
Nadia Saleh (second right) wears a blue hijab as she hands out for the local council elections
The mother-of-four did an SBS television interview about her area in 2014, but did not wear a hijab
‘This is the experience that I went through. (It) made me more determined to focus and learn more about supporting and strengthening community members.’
She is taking her local government spot from her husband, a former deputy mayor, who is retiring after 13 years on the council.
However, her election had one unkind critic in the Muslim community, with one fundamentalist man asking on Facebook how she could be a member of the Labor Party, which supports gay marriage.
‘All those who legislate by other than the Koran are disbelievers,’ he said.
‘Not to mention that she is now part of a political team whose leader openly supports men having sex with other men.’
Nadia Saleh (left) is joined by her husband Khodr Saleh (second left), senior Labor frontbencher Tony Burke (second right) and Muslim NSW Labor MP Jihad Dib
The local identity was joined on hustings by Lebanese-born state Labor MP and former Punchbowl Boys High School principal Jihad Dib, the first Muslim elected to the lower house of the New South Wales parliament.
Mrs Saleh joins a small group of Muslim politicians in Australia, which includes federal MPs Ed Husic and Anne Aly, and NSW upper house member Shaoquett Moselmane, who also hails from Lebanon.
Labor senator Sam Dastyari, who moved to Australia from Iran when he was four in 1988, is an atheist who describes himself as a ‘non-practising Muslim’.
Early counting in the City of Canterbury-Bankstown council election shows Labor winning at least eight spots out of the 15 to have a majority.