A British Member of Parliament (MP) from the Labour Party, Rupa Huq, publicly apologized to Ghanaian-born British MP, Kwasi Kwarteng, who also doubles as the UK’s Chancellor of the Exchequer (Finance Minister).
According to news.sky.com, the party suspended Rupa Huq for describing Kwasi Kwarteng as a “superficially” black man.
Huq almost immediately tweeted her apology on September 23. It read: “I have today contacted Kwasi Kwarteng to offer my sincere and heartfelt apologies for the comments I made at yesterday’s Labour conference fringe meeting.
“My comments were ill-judged and I wholeheartedly apologise to anyone affected,” her post read.
The controversial comment:
A report indicated that the suspended MP made the racist comments against the chancellor in an audio recording posted online by the Guido Fawkes website.
“Superficially he is a black man. He went to Eton, I think, he went to a very expensive prep school, all the way through, the top schools in the country.
“If you hear him on the Today programme, you wouldn’t know he is black,” Rupa Huq was quoted to have said by news.sky.com.
The Labour Party condemned the remarks.
Background on Kwesi Kwarteng:
Kwasi Kwarteng became the first black person to become UK’s Chancellor of the Exchequer (Finance Minister) following his appointment by UK Prime Minister, Liz Truss, on September 6, 2022.
Kwarteng was born Akwasi Addo Alfred Kwarteng in Waltham Forest, East London, in May 1975 to Ghanaian parents, Alfred and Charlotte, who had both immigrated to the United Kingdom a decade earlier as students.
His parents, who went on to become an international economist and a barrister respectively, sent him to an expensive private prep school that produced numerous Cabinet-level politicians.
He then attended the famous Eton college — a production line for British leaders including Boris Johnson and David Cameron.
Source: Ghanaweb