Informed, Unafraid, Engaged: a strategy for Canadian Muslim leadership, at the ballot box and in the economy

Canadian Muslims are courted every election and forgotten the day after. Candidates arrive at Eid dinners, brokers promise whole neighbourhoods, and the community is told to vote for the lesser evil. That is not power. It is a habit, and it is time to break it.

In the past year, Ottawa moved to strip the good-faith religious defence from the Criminal Code’s hate propaganda provisions, and Quebec banned collective prayer in streets and parks without municipal permission. Hundreds of Muslim organizations objected. Many of the politicians who made these decisions had counted on Muslim votes.

We have also learned how Islamophobia is used. In election season it becomes a talking point: a statement at a mosque, a promise of action, a hashtag after a tragedy, a photo with community leaders. Then the ballots are counted and the voices go quiet. When a sister is attacked on the street for wearing hijab, when a mosque is vandalized, when students are harassed or professionals lose their jobs for speaking about Gaza, the defenders who were so loud in October are nowhere to be found. The cameras move on, the coverage disappears and the community is left to defend itself. Islamophobia is treated as a campaign issue to be managed, not a real danger to be confronted. Concern that appears only when votes are needed is not solidarity. It is strategy.

Votes alone did not protect us, because votes alone are not power. Power is votes plus skills, knowledge, ownership and capital. A community that only shows up on election day is a customer. A community that builds companies, trains leaders, creates jobs and brings investment to its city is a partner, and partners are not ignored.

Real power is not funding the establishment or pouring millions of dollars into campaigns in the hope that politicians will serve us. Money given to buy favour buys a photo, a meeting and a promise that expires after the election. Real power is leading: raising and backing our own leaders, people with the knowledge, skill and courage to speak with a strong voice inside every institution, and to add real value to it. When we bring talent, ideas and solutions to the table, we are no longer asking to be served. We are helping to govern.

The lesson is not to retreat. It is to stop being delivered and start leading. Here are ten commitments to get us there.

Ten commitments

1. We are not a captive bloc. No party owns our votes and no broker can deliver them. A community that votes the same way regardless of the record has no leverage, only loyalty that is taken for granted. For decades, too many in our community have treated the Liberal Party as a default home. It is time to opt out of automatic loyalty to any party, Liberal included, and make every party earn our trust.

2. We vote on records, not labels. Read how a candidate actually voted on religious freedom, on Gaza, on housing and transit. Endorsements are information, not instructions. No one speaks for your ballot.

3. We do not vote out of fear. Choosing the lesser evil every cycle lets others set the agenda and leaves us choosing between their candidates. Fear keeps a community quiet. Confidence makes it heard.

4. We build our own leaders. Most seats are decided at the nomination stage, years before election day. We must find people in every profession, train them in the mechanics of politics, give them real roles, and back them as candidates, staff and appointees. Leaders who come from the community can serve in any party and keep their conscience.

5. We turn knowledge into skills, and skills into influence. Our community is full of engineers, doctors, pharmacists, accountants, tradespeople, teachers and entrepreneurs. Too many arrive with world-class credentials and end up underemployed, because foreign experience goes unrecognized and professional networks stay closed. We will mentor newcomers through licensing, open our workplaces to apprentices and interns, and teach the skills that move a career forward: negotiation, public speaking, financial literacy, digital and technical training, and how government actually works. Every mosque, school and community centre can be a place where knowledge is shared, not only received.

6. We build economic power, not just political noise. A community that owns businesses, hires its neighbours and sits on boards is heard long after the campaign ends. We will start and grow businesses, buy from one another, form co-operatives and investment circles, and learn to compete for public contracts on merit. We will build wealth through ethical finance that matches our values, and pass on to our children ownership, not only paycheques. Economic independence is political independence: no one can buy the loyalty of people who do not depend on them.

But wealth is not the same as leadership. Some of our most successful business owners have chosen to side with the establishment: writing cheques to whoever holds power, posing for photos at fundraisers, and staying silent when their own community is targeted, all to protect a permit, a contract or a tax break. That is not influence. It is self-interest dressed up as access. A system built only on profit will always ask us to trade our principles for a seat near the table, and too many have accepted the trade. Economic power that serves only its owner is just another broker. The same dollars that buy a front-row seat at an establishment fundraiser could train a hundred young organizers or carry one of our own through a nomination race. We need business leaders who use their success to lift workers, fund new leaders and speak up when it costs them something, not ones who sell the community’s voice to keep their own doors open.

7. We bring investment and opportunity to our cities. Canadian Muslims carry languages, family ties and business relationships across the Gulf, Africa, South Asia, Turkey and Southeast Asia. That is an asset Toronto and Canada barely use. We can be the bridge that brings responsible investment, trade and good jobs home, into housing, infrastructure, clean technology, manufacturing and small business. That investment must be transparent, follow Canadian law and benefit every neighbour, with local hiring, fair wages and community benefits in writing. When we help our city grow, we earn a seat at the table that no broker can sell.

8. We do not live in a bubble. Our leaders must fight for rent, transit, schools and safety for every neighbour, not only on Muslim issues. We belong on school councils, tenant associations, unions, chambers of commerce, professional bodies and hospital boards. Build relationships before a crisis, so solidarity is never a cold call.

9. We stand at the forefront in defending Palestine. This is a matter of conscience grounded in international law and human dignity, principles that belong to everyone. We stand alongside the Jewish, Christian, labour and student allies already in this movement. Our language stays on states, policies and rights, never on any people. And our economic choices, where we invest, what we buy and which contracts our governments sign, are part of that conscience.

10. We educate ourselves before we act. Know which level of government decides what, how bills pass, how budgets are made and where pressure lands. Know your Charter rights and their limits. Check sources before sharing them. An educated community cannot be led astray, by brokers, by misinformation, or by tactics that feel righteous and hand opponents a weapon.

Answering the objections

“Without a bloc, we lose leverage.” Leverage built on obedience lasts until the broker is bought. Leverage built on informed voters, organized volunteers, strong businesses and our own candidates lasts for generations.

“Every party has failed us, so why engage at all?” Withdrawal hands the field to those who would legislate against us. The answer to bad options is better candidates, and those come from contesting nominations, not boycotting them.

“Economics is a distraction from the real fight.” It is the foundation of the real fight. Campaigns need donors, candidates need careers they can step away from, and advocacy needs institutions that last. A community that cannot fund its own causes will always be asked to wait its turn.

“Our business leaders are just being practical.” Practical for whom? Backing the establishment to protect your own margins keeps the same people in power and the same doors closed to everyone else. The community does not owe loyalty to anyone who trades its voice for their own advantage. Success comes with responsibility: to your workers, to your neighbours and to the principles you claim to share.

“Palestine makes Muslims one-issue voters.” Palestine is a central issue of conscience, not the only one. The same leaders who speak for Gaza must deliver on housing, jobs and schools, or they do not deserve our support.

“This is identity politics.” It is the opposite. We are asking Canadian Muslims to leave the bubble, serve the whole city, create jobs for everyone and build alliances across faiths. Christian, Sikh and Jewish leaders stood with us on religious freedom. We will stand with them.

Stop asking who will protect us

For too long, Canadian Muslims have asked which party will protect us. The better question is who among us will lead: in council chambers, in boardrooms, in classrooms and on job sites. The next provincial, federal and municipal elections will be won or lost in nomination meetings, training rooms and coalitions built long before the ballots are printed. The next generation’s security will be won in the businesses we build, the skills we pass on and the investment we bring home.

Informed, not delivered. Unafraid, not silent. Empowered, not dependent. Engaged with the whole country, not walled off from it. That is how a community stops being used and starts shaping Canada.

Dr. Bahira Abdulsalam, PhD, P.Eng. Founder, Be The Change Movement · bahira.ca

Sources

• Canadian Press via CJME: Quebec prayer law
• Anglican Journal: Bill C-9 passes the House
• CCCC: Bill C-9 Senate debate
• National Post: 350+ Muslim organizations on Bill C-9