NANA AKUA: Apparently there’s only one viewpoint a black person can express without being pilloried – the woke one. If that’s not racist, then what is?

Once I turned a presenter for GB Information and a columnist for the Mail, I steeled myself for toxic hate mail and vile threats from Left-wing trolls. As each centre-Proper commentator is aware of, it is simply a part of the job.

What I wasn’t anticipating, nevertheless, was the abuse hurled at me primarily based on the color of my pores and skin by different black folks.

Throughout the Tory management contest two years in the past, I spoke out in help of candidate Kemi Badenoch, a black lady like me. She had been accused by a distinguished black activist of being ‘a racial-gatekeeping executioner of Tory racist insurance policies’.

The ugly implication was that, as a lady of Nigerian descent, Badenoch could not probably maintain robust Conservative views. As a substitute, she have to be pretending to take action in pursuit of her political ambitions.

Once I defended her, I used to be appalled to see many of the backlash got here from different black and Asian folks.

Some referred to as me ‘coconut’, a slur to explain somebody who’s brown on the surface however appears ‘white’ on the within.

That could be a time period I am sadly all too conversant in. It’s a favorite insult used within the feedback on my social media posts.

I used to be reminded of this nasty slur when this week an image emerged of Marieha Mohsin Hussain, a married college instructor from Buckinghamshire, gleefully holding up an indication depicting Suella Braverman and Rishi Sunak as coconuts throughout Saturday’s pro-Palestinian march in London.

Associates of the 36-year-old insist there ‘is not a malicious bone in her physique’. All I can say is that Ms Hussain, whose father is from Pakistan, clearly wants to return to highschool herself if she fails to understand the racist implications of her placard.

Behind it lies the ugly notion that ethnic minorities shouldn’t ‘break the mould’. Bigots consider black folks ought to by no means be rich or profitable. Quite, we should always endlessly deal with our personal victimhood.

Anybody who refuses to parrot the woke foyer’s whines about racism, immigration and identification politics is deemed ‘a traitor’. And, as I’ve unhappily found in my very own profession, we’re additionally accused of being a ‘token’ black voice.

In different phrases, there is just one viewpoint a black individual can specific with out being pilloried. If that is not racist, then what’s?

But since such language is just too usually hurled by ethnic minorities themselves, it has gone unchecked for a lot too lengthy.

In June 2020, it was introduced {that a} new fee on racial inequalities can be headed up by Munira Mirza, chief of Quantity 10’s coverage unit. The daughter of fogeys from Pakistan, she has criticised the ‘politics of grievance’ as a barrier to progress.

This enraged outspoken race-relations activist Dr Shola Mos-Shogbamimu — herself of Nigerian descent — who denounced Mirza as a ‘brown executioner’ of ‘white supremacy’.

And in September final yr, Labour MP Rupa Huq, whose dad and mom are from Bangladesh, steered that former chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng was solely ‘superficially black’.

Her rationalization? ‘He went to Eton, I believe he went to a really costly prep college… in case you hear him on the At the moment programme, you would not know he’s black.’

What are we imagined to take from that? That the one method to be black is to be badly educated, badly spoken, poor and Left-wing? It is frankly disgusting.

I could not agree with all of Rishi Sunak or Suella Braverman’s insurance policies. However I can admire that they’ve risen by way of the ranks due to sheer expertise — and never as a result of they’re ‘coconuts… determined to assimilate to white folks’, as actress Jameela Jamil — a detailed buddy of Meghan Markle —claimed in a put up on Twitter (now X), earlier this yr.

It is time to ditch the outdated concept that white folks solely could be prejudiced.

In my opinion, the folks of color who promote this detestable corruption of the phrase ‘coconut’ are racists, too.