Derry Mayor Lilian Seenoi-Barr is back in the news as she reminds people of the “unprecedented” level of hate which was directed at her following her elevation to the role two months ago.
Needless to say, any abuse of any elected person, or indeed any other person, is much to be deplored, needless to say.
In fact, a man has been arrested over online threats made against Seenoi-Barr, indicative that the PSNI take such complaints seriously, although she has accused the force of a “heavy-handed approach” to Black Lives Matters protests, and of engaging in racial profiling and of “biased policing practices” – saying there needs to be a “zero-tolerance approach to racism within our police service and society as a whole”.
She has also said that “racism is present in every nook and corner of these islands” and that black people face a “pandemic” of racism.
Seenoi-Barr attracted attention previously for claiming in a BBC interview that people who were protesting against asylum accommodation were “terrorists”. She herself came to the North as an asylum seeker in 2010.
Spare a thought, however, for SDLP leader Colum Eastwood, the MP for Derry, whose announcement that he was resigning yesterday was partly overshadowed by reporting on the Mayor’s ongoing tale of woe. Ironic, perhaps, given that Eastwood’s backing for her appointment in the face of opposition among the SDLP’s other elected representatives – one of whom, Jason Barr, resigned over what he claimed was the “undemocratic” manner in which Seenoi-Barr had been selected – might perhaps have been one of the contributory factors in his shock departure.
However, an examination of the Mayor’s background seems to shed an interesting light on her tale of woe – including the media’s lack of interest in the political views of her brother – who attended the ceremony in Derry where Ms Seenoi-Barr assumed the chains of office.
Despite coming from a prosperous Maasai family who owned a supermarket, Seenoi-Barr came to live in the north and to claim asylum in 2010. She was granted asylum on the basis that she and her son had received threats due to her activism against the barbarous practise of female genital mutilation.
FGM was banned in Kenya in 2011 and is very unusual outside certain regions including that where the Maasai are the main ethnic group. UNICEF has estimated that 78% of Maasai girls are subject to the mutilations.
There are very few Kenyans in Ireland who have come here to claim refugee status here due to FGM or any other reason. Indeed, there are very few Kenyans who claim refugee status anywhere.
2022 is the last year for which we have statistics and in that year 16,457 persons, almost all from other African countries, applied for refugee status in Kenya compared to just 2,057 Kenyans out of more than 54 million who applied for asylum in the whole world. The Irish state received just 44 of those applications and a mere 12 of these were initially accepted.
The United Kingdom, of which Derry is a part, and which has over 100,000 persons of Kenyan birth who have come to the UK legitimately, received just 106 applications in 2022 of which just 28 were accepted.
Seenoi-Barr’s brother is one Ledama Olekina, a Senator and one of the main opposition leaders in Kenya, and reportedly a wealthy and powerful man.
He told Belfast Live that the Masaai are a “very, very small community. Among the Maasai, we have seven clans and in my own clan even for me to become a Senator is unheard of, so for her to become a Mayor is something which really is a lot.”
Senator Ledama Olekina would not seem to share his sister’s total opposition to FGM. He is President of the Maasai Education Discovery which appears to take a “cultural relativist” approach to this barbarism among the Maasai.
He opposed its being criminalised and has said that “activists” who are opposed to FGM “have failed to understand the cultures behind the practice, and their ignorance is dangerous. Legislation, particularly the criminalization of FGM, and other external pressure that do not take local culture into account can have deadly consequences.”
Please join me in congratulating my baby sister Councillor Lilian Seenoi @Lseenoi for being elected as the first black - Maasai Mayor of the City of Derry , Northern Ireland , United Kingdom. https://t.co/b7a3fQ0SDo may the good lord open many doors for you as you lead your… pic.twitter.com/TqjjO3MKJs
— Sen. Ledama Olekina (@ledamalekina) April 29, 2024
He also cleaves to very illiberal views on gay people. Just this March, Senator Olekina praised the introduction by Uganda of savage measures against gay people, including the death penalty in some cases and 20-year sentences. In response to a question from the The Star in Nairobi, the Mayor of Derry’s brother welcomed the Ugandan measures and attacked the recognition by the Kenyan state of “gay associations.”
Of course, Mayor Seenoi-Barr is not responsible for the views of her brother but perhaps she might address some of those issues before again setting out to attack people who disagree with her or portray people who protest against immigration as racists and terrorists.