Residents protest racist police killing in Footscray

Somali man Abdifatah Ahmed was shot dead by two Victoria Police officers in Footscray, in Melbourne’s west, just before the Easter weekend. In the lead-up to Abdifatah’s murder, authorities announced that “uniform police, the Public Order Response Team and the Dog Squad will be out in force in Footscray over the coming weeks, as Victoria Police runs a series of operations in the area”.

Abdifatah was 35 and homeless; people in the area say he was smiley and friendly. There is now a memorial where he was shot. The flowers, laid by Footscray residents, friends and family, are piling on each other. A sign reads that Abdifatah was “shot dead here by your gestapo police, trigger happy, Victoria Police”.

Police Commander Timothy Tully supported the officers involved and declared that the shooting wasn’t racially motivated. The police are now investigating the shooting—but this will likely go nowhere as it is police investigating police. They also established a mobile surveillance unit in the middle of Nicholson Street Mall to spy on Footscray residents 24/7.

Victorian Police have a track record of racial profiling and harassment of Black and brown people in Melbourne’s west and across the state. According to the Racial Profiling Data Monitoring Project, in 2023, Aboriginal people were eleven times more likely to be searched by police than white people; people of African descent were six times more likely to be searched.

A groundbreaking study by Inner Melbourne Community Legal also found evidence of racial profiling during the Covid-19 pandemic lockdowns. Doctor Tamar Hopkins, who led the study, found that “African/Middle Eastern appearing people were more likely to be issued with a fine ... than white people”. Some police operations resulted in up to 40 percent of fines being issued to African and Middle Eastern people.

All of this comes after a landmark 2013 racial profiling legal case resulted in Victoria Police agreeing to review their practices and vowing to eliminate racial profiling. Two years later, Anthony Kelly from the Flemington Kensington Community Legal Centre noted that their clients still complained about “being stopped by the police multiple times”.

The legal centre also released a report, “The More Things Change, The More They Stay The Same”, which found that young people in suburbs neighbouring Footscray, such as Sunshine and Flemington, continued to experience high levels of racial profiling.

Victoria Police have become more militarised than ever under the state Labor government, receiving $4.51 billion in the latest budget. New bail laws introduced in March give the police and prison systems more power to imprison hundreds of children, specifically targeting Aboriginal and African migrant children.

If only such resources and efforts were directed to addressing things like homelessness and poverty, which riddle the lives of those living in the western suburbs of Melbourne.

The Council to Homeless Persons in 2022 counted 613 homeless people in Footscray. That was before the cost-of-living crisis hit. The following year, the Victorian Council of Social Service’s “Mapping Poverty in Victoria” report estimated that 13 percent of Footscray residents lived in poverty.

We need systematic change in Footscray and across the country. The “special” police operations that result in suburbs being flooded with gangs of cops must end, and officers should be banned from using guns. We must build affordable public housing for all poor and working-class people while properly funding social services.

On 22 April, Footscray residents held a rally of more than 500 people, who marched to the police station to demand justice for Abdifatah. “We want justice—we are not going to give up”, Zainab, a local, told Red Flag.

“People do not need guns, they need care”, said Dr Berhan Ahmed, CEO of Africause, a community service organisation. “We are seeking justice for the future of our kids.”