Politics

SDLP politician receives death threats after being selected as Northern Ireland’s first black mayor

Lilian Seenoi-Barr says she has faced racist abuse since moving to the North and into politics but latest wave goes ‘beyond’ past experience

SDLP councillor Lilian Seenoi-Barr will make history when she is appointed as the first citizen of Derry and Strabane District Council next month. Photograph: Mark Hamill

Seanín Graham
Sun May 5 2024 - 16:04

A councillor who received death threats after she was selected as Northern Ireland’s first black mayor has vowed to focus on the “positives” in the role.

Lilian Seenoi-Barr, originally from Kenya, said the escalation in racist abuse and threats to her life since the announcement had been “extremely hurtful” for her family but that it had made her “more determined” to succeed.

The SDLP councillor will make history when she is appointed as the first citizen of Derry and Strabane District Council next month. Her party leader Colum Eastwood condemned the abuse and what he described as “very serious death threats” aimed at Ms Seenoi-Barr, who settled in Derry in 2010 after coming to Northern Ireland as a refugee.

She said on Sunday that she had received racist abuse since moving to the North and putting herself forward to represent her community, but that the recent online abuse was “beyond” anything previously experienced.

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The American far-right conspiracy theorist Alex Jones – who claimed the Sandy Hook shootings were a hoax – is among those who have targeted her on social media.

“My family is the one that is feeling it more than myself, I’m used to it,” Ms Seenoi-Barr told the BBC NI’s Sunday Politics programme. “The death threats have been extremely hurtful to my family and to myself too, but I’m more focused on the positives. I have had enormous support across the island – community organisations, politicians who have reached out and stood in solidarity. That is the Derry I know, the Ireland I know, and that’s what I want to focus on.”

The SDLP’s selection process for the mayoral role sparked a bitter internal row and led to the resignation of two other councillors, who branded it “undemocratic”. Jason Barr, the current SDLP deputy mayor, and Shauna Cusack, had put themselves forward for the role and will now continue as independents.

I’m honestly focused on the way forward, I’m focused on serving my community

—  Lilian Seenoi-Barr

Mr Eastwood conceded the party has lessons to learn over how it communicated a new policy on selecting candidates. However, he insisted that Ms Seenoi-Barr was the “stand-out” candidate to become mayor.

Asked about the development on Sunday, the councillor insisted it was an “open” selection process involving a “robust” interview.

“It’s obviously disappointing that two of my colleagues who I have worked with the last three years since I got to council, decided to resign,” she said. “But I’m honestly focused on the way forward, I’m focused on serving my community.”

Referring to the past’s week migration row between the British and Irish governments following claims about an upsurge in migrants crossing the Border from Northern Ireland, Ms Seenoi-Barr said it was important to remember that “there are people at the heart of this debate”.

“The push factors that are making them come here is what we need to consider,” she added. “There is a lot of discussion about the pull factors, there is nothing that is pulling them towards this country. They’re being pushed away from their countries and Ireland, for example, should know this ... people left this country because of famine. They left this country because of conflict.

“Those people coming here are experiencing exactly the same issues that Ireland was experiencing.”

Seanín Graham

Seanín Graham

Seanín Graham is Northern Correspondent of The Irish Times

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