Category: Columnists

Columnists
Dear world, Nigeria needs your help to #EndSARS

We are Nigerian students schooling in a lesser known part of the world called the Turkish Republic of North Cyprus (TRNC). For those who have never visited, it is one of two states on the island of Cyprus, located in the Eastern Mediterranean, but for us it is our second home. If you have been […]

Columnists
Racism kills yet again
 

“I can’t breathe”. The last words George Floyd uttered, just before he was murdered in cold blood in Minneapolis, USA. George Floyd has entered into the statistics of those many killed by this cruel State. Neither his family, nor anti-racists around the world will allow him to be just another American statistic. The cries of […]

Columnists
My first memories of smell at home and in London, Britain

The jessamine is odorous; so Maid lilies are, and clematis And where tall meadowsweet flowers grow A rare and subtle perfume is; – What can there be more choice than these? – A rose when it doth bud and blow.” By Christina Rosetti (1830-1894)   When I began interviewing people about their memory of smell […]

Columnists
Coronavirus and the empathy-deficient people

Two photographs, two family tragedies. The first of these show a three-year-old girl, Ayşe, wiping tears off her grandmother’s face with a tissue, oblivious to the tragedy her family has just suffered. The grandmother, also called Ayşe, is shedding tears for her daughter, little Ayşe’s mum Sonya Kaygan, who has just lost her life to […]

Columnists
‘Everywhere bar Ercan’ for corona-stranded Brits in North Cyprus

Ten days ago, I highlighted the plight of some 120 British nationals, many of Turkish Cypriot descent, stranded in North Cyprus due to the coronavirus pandemic. Lots of affected individuals, their British MPs, and community groups have all been lobbying the UK Foreign Office to demand their return. Since then, there has been a flurry […]

Columnists
Why has Britain abandoned its citizens in North Cyprus?

Over 120 British nationals, many of them of Turkish Cypriot descent, are currently stranded in North Cyprus, unable to get any flights back to the UK. All international flights on both sides of the Cyprus divide were grounded In March to contain the coronavirus pandemic. In the same month, UK Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab announced […]

Columnists
Talking dolma, direct flights & refugees with Faiza Shaheen, Labour’s new hope for Chingford & Woodford Green

One of the most closely contested constituencies of this General Election is one in East London. Labour are after a big scalp: that of Iain Duncan Smith, the former Conservative leader and architect of the widely despised Universal Credit benefits system. Standing against him is Faiza Shaheen, a 36-year-old British economist. The Labour candidate grew […]