London: Conservative Party MP Nusrat Ghani said a party whip told her she was fired last February as U.K. transport minister because her Muslim faith made her colleagues “uncomfortable,” The Times reported.
According to Ghani, a government whip told her that party members at a Downing Street meeting discussed concerns that she “wasn’t loyal to the party” because she didn’t do enough defend it “against Islamophobia allegations,” she said.
“It was like being punched in the stomach,” she told the newspaper. “I felt humiliated and powerless.”
The government’s chief whip, Mark Spencer, said on Twitter that he was the person Ghani was referring to and denied the claims.
“These accusations are completely false and I consider them to be defamatory,” Sepncer wrote. “I have never used those words attributed to me.”
After party members assured Ghani that they weren’t Islamophobic, she was later informed that if she continued to raise concerns about her firing, she would be ostracized by colleagues and her reputation ruined.
Ghani said the whip told her that her “Muslimness was raised as an issue” at Downing Street. She said she’s reconsidering her role as an MP. She served as minister between 2018 and 2020.
“I will not pretend that this hasn’t shaken my faith in the party,” she was quoted as saying.
Amid a wider crisis that’s shaken faith in Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s leadership, recent Tory scandals include accusations of bribery and threats of blackmail. -Bloomberg