London’s first Muslim mayor on Saturday said he hoped his election victory would inspire other Muslims to enter politics, local media reported.
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He received a total of 1,310,143 votes – 57% of the total – compared to Conservative Zac Goldsmith’s 994,614, after the capital had its largest ever turnout at 45.6%.
The Labour leader was conspicuous by his absence from Khan’s official swearing-in ceremony at Southwark Cathedral in South-East London yesterday.
And the pair even missed each other at Khan’s official victory party on Friday, with Corbyn arriving – and leaving – several hours before the London Mayor showed up.
Cardinal Vincent Nichols welcomed the news, saying: “I assure him of my prayers for his time in this important office in which he will face the great challenges of London, in its richness, diversity and energy”. I am so proud of our city. Londoners deserved better and I hope its something the Conservative Party will never try to repeat, he wrote. “Fear doesn’t make us safer, it only makes us weaker”, he said, “and the politics of fear is simply not welcome in our city”.
The possibility of a division was further hinted at in Mr Khan’s Observer article, as he set out what he believed Labour needed to do to win in future.
Though it appeared mathematically impossible that Goldsmith could catch him on second-preference votes, but the count had to officially go into second preference votes to cover the 50 per cent vote share mark required for a clear victory.
Corbyn, who chose to travel to Bristol to congratulate the new Labour mayor of that city rather than see Khan, said he and the new London mayor were “getting on fine”.
Want more hot BPR News stories? He said he will step down from parliament after succeeding Conservative Boris Johnson as mayor. “I wish him every possible success”.
Sadiq Khan, you know, said he spent his entire adult life fighting extremism and yes, he has, you know, met with unsavory figures in the past as part of his career – his former career in as a human rights lawyer.
ANTHONY MASON: London is now the first major Western city with a Muslim mayor.
However, that is unlikely to be enough to insulate Cameron from questions about why he and Goldsmith were drawn into a campaign to paint Khan as a security risk.
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He said: “Sadiq Khan very kindly met with British Cycling during his election campaign, and it was both interesting and encouraging to hear his pledges for cycling in London, which included increasing the proportion of Transport for London spending on cycling”. How significant is Khan’s election for Europe in general?
