Boris Johnson has been accused of racial stereotyping over comments he made about Nigerians’ interest in money.
The Prime Minister wrote in a column while editor of The Spectator magazine that young people had “an almost Nigerian interest in money”.
Johnson has been embroiled in a number of racial scandals linked to columns over the years, including referring to black people as “piccaninnies” with “watermelon smiles” and describing women who wear burkas as “letterboxes”.
Now, in another unearthed column for the Independent on Sunday in 1999, the Prime Minister said Tony Blair had made people feel good about getting rich.
He wrote: “All the young people I know – ie those under 30 – are just as avaricious as we flinty Thatcherite yuppies of the 1980s – in fact, they have an almost Nigerian interest in money and gadgets of all kind.”
Weyman Bennett, from Stand up to Racism, said the comments were “deeply racist and offensive”.
Speaking to the Guardian, he said: “This is deeply offensive and unforgivable and should not be ignored and he should be held to account.
“This can be added to ‘piccaninnies’ and ‘watermelon smies’, the abject refusal to properly apologise and change his behaviour around racism.
“Boris Johnson is unfit to be a Prime Minister that represents the entire United Kingdm.”
Mr Bennett accused Johnson of falsely representing minority communities in the country.
In another unearthed column from 1995 in the Spectator, the Prime Minister branded the children of single mothers “ill-raised, ignorant, aggressive and illegitimate” in a magazine column, it has emerged.
In the same column, he argued it was “feeble” for a man to be reluctant or unable to “take control of his woman.”
He said it was “outrageous” that married couples should fund “‘the single mothers’ desire to procreate independently of men.”
And he said a way needed to be found to “restore women’s desire to be married.”
Shadow Attorney General Shami Chakrabarti said: “These unearthed comments further reveal Boris Johnson ‘s contempt for women and families, as he hypocritically attacks what he appallingly describes as ‘illegitimate’ children.
“From attacking single mothers working hard to raise their kids, to advocating sexual harassment in the workplace, his sexist comments are an affront to women everywhere. He has no right to attend or have any involvement in this event.
“Someone whose attitudes towards women are straight out of the dark ages is not fit to be prime minister of our country.”
It emerged in September that Mr Johnson wrote that David Cameron is a “girly swot” on a private Cabinet paper.
It came days after Mr Johnson used similar language in the Commons, calling Jeremy Corbyn a “big girl’s blouse” over the Labour leader’s decision not to back the PM’s bid for an election while the risk of a no-deal Brexit remained. (Mirror)
