MUSLIMS have reported the most discrimination among any followers of faith, a university study found.
The Monash University study Mapping Social Cohesion 2012 surveyed areas in Greater Dandenong, Hume and two council areas in Sydney.
It found that in the past two years, 34 per cent of Muslims felt discriminated for their faith, skin colour or ethnic origin.
Islamic Council of Victoria director Nazeem Hussain said discrimination was already known in the Muslim community.
He said it was inflamed by the ongoing asylum seeker debate, which “plays on a racist kind of narrative” filtering top down from federal politics to wider society.
Greater Dandenong’s Islamic population has grown from 8667 to 13,600 in the decade to 2011.
Imam Ibrahim Onerdic, of the Noble Park-based Bosnian and Herzegovinian Islamic Society, said he hadn’t heard of instances of discrimination in Greater Dandenong. He had known of Muslims changing their name to score a job.
Khaliq Fazal, president of Afghan-Australian Association of Victoria, said Australia was more tolerant than many other Western countries.
— Cameron Lucadou-Wells
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