As the first ever Muslim assistant chief prosecutor he took on some of the toughest criminal cases in the face of vile personal threats. Somehow, he remains optimistic …
It is an unconscionably bleak week for antiracist activism when I meet Nazir Afzal OBE, former chief prosecutor, now chancellor of Manchester university and chair of multiple charities. The 61-year-old is drinking a Red Bull, which is the only perceptible trace that the far-right riots around the UK are, in his words, “taking a toll”. “It’s been tiring and it’s been emotional,” he says. “I’ve had people coming to me from all over the country, particularly people in minority communities, not just Muslim communities, saying: ‘What’s happening? What can we do? I’m scared.’ What can I say to them, in terms of reassurance? All I can say is what I’ve been saying all week: there will be consequences for those involved. We might have more smartphones, but we have fewer smart people. Every crime has been recorded.”
Afzal describes his life as a lawyer, and his life before that, as one of stubborn faith that the law could be used as a force for social good. But when people ask the questions he describes – “How do we get through this? What do I say to my family? What do I say to my children?” – the promise that justice will be served is not only a vital reassurance, it reflects how bad things have become. “It’s what I remember from the 60s and 70s,” he says. “It’s what my children don’t remember because they’ve never seen it, but they’re feeling it now. I’m glad my parents aren’t alive to see this.”
