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Toronto, Canada’s first Sikh Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan was heckled in Parliament with an Opposition member shouting that MPs needed an “English-to-English” translation as he spoke, an act dubbed as “racist”.
Veteran Conservative MP Jason Kenney sparked a controversy during question period with the heckling directed at Sajjan while the minister was responding about the military mission against the Islamic State.
Kenney, a former Defence and Immigration Minister, said MPs needed an “English-to-English” translation of Sajjan’s responses.
Fortyfive-year-old Sajjan was in November named Canada’s Defence Minister in the Justin Trudeau Cabinet. He is a combat veteran and has served in Bosnia and had three deployments to Afghanistan. He moved to Canada with his family when he was five.
Sajjan’s fellow Liberals were quick to pounce on Kenney, describing his heckling on Monday as racist, the Huffington Post Canada reported.
After question period, Liberal Kevin Lamoureux rose on a point of order asking Kenney to apologise for an “inappropriate comment”. “I’m wondering if the member would do the proper thing and apologise or at the very least explain his comments,” he was quoted as saying.
Liberal MP Ruby Sahota called Kenney’s refusal to apologise unacceptable. “Shame on @jkenney for his racist remarks during today’s qp toward #harjitsajjan. His refusal to apologise is unacceptable,” she tweeted.
Kenney rejected calls to apologise, saying he found the Minister’s answer “totally incoherent”.
Another Indian-origin MP Raj Grewal said, “Kenney should apologise.” Kenney responded saying he respects Sajjan — “a fine, intelligent man… unfortunately, I find his answers on ending combat against ISIS to be at best unpersuasive (and) at worst incoherent”.
