A frustrated father’s tweet about the fact that his 6-year-old son’s name, Syed Adam Ahmed, is on the Canadian no-fly list is making international headlines — and raising important conversations about racial profiling.
“Why is our (Canadian born) 6 year old on DHP no fly list? He must clear security each time,” fumed Sulemaan Ahmed to Air Canada on Twitter New Year’s Eve, when he and his son were delayed at Toronto Pearson International Airport en route to Boston to watch the annual NHL Winter Classic because his son had been given the “Deemed High Profile” label.
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Photo: Sulemaan Ahmed/Twitter
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Air Canada responded to the Canadian-born father (himself a former Air Canada flight attendant), suggesting that he speak with a check-in supervisor at the airport. But Ahmed explained that he’d “tried that for years & supervisors told us there is nothing they can do,” adding in another tweet, “We respect security but you are better than this.”
Canada’s public safety minister, Ralph Goodale, agrees and has promised to investigate. “Canadians expect their government to deliver on two vital imperatives — namely, keeping them safe while safeguarding their values and this country’s fundamental character,” he remarked, according to the New York Times. (Air Canada’s Monday response reiterated that the airline “complies with the regulations of the countries in which we operate, including with respect to matters of security.”)
And while the child’s mother, Khadija Cajee, is also taking the matter to officials — reportedly meeting this week with her member of Parliament, Jane Philpott — the family remains in outrage that this drama is even an issue. “Every agent has been really sympathetic to our situation,” Cajee told CBC News. “There are always eye rolls, they’re always in disbelief. A lot of times they think it’s my husband so they look at him, but he always says to them, ‘No, it’s the little guy down there.’"
The South Africa-born Cajee told Global News, “He’s basically being carded for being Muslim,” noting that the child has never been able to check in for flights online and has required a special clearance every trip since he was a toddler. “Adam’s date of birth and his age should be proof enough that he shouldn’t be on this list,” she has said. “Because he is not the problem."
The issue, insists Adam’s father, is profiling. “We’re hoping to understand what’s going on, why this 6-year-old is being treated like a suspected terrorist,” he said. “Why is he marginalized based on his name, race and/or religion? And we feel if the federal government deems any child – a Canadian child – a suspect, then as parents we have a right to know why.”
In the past, people have ended up on the list because of name similarities, Hugh Handeyside, a staff attorney in the American Civil Liberties Union’s National Security Project, tells Yahoo Parenting. “Since the list itself is so secret and underlying information so secret as well, it’s not surprising that sometimes you have cases where it’s blatantly unjust.”
“This has the appearance of mistaken identity,” Bill Smullen, Maxwell senior fellow in national security and director of national security studies at Syracuse University adds to Yahoo Parenting. “There is a high probability he owns the same name as someone who is a potential threat and is instead an adult who should be on the no-fly list. The likelihood of the 6-year-old being a national security threat is slim to none.” Calling the problem a “case of bureaucratic misjudgment,” Smullen says, “Given that he is Canadian born, this should easily be cleared up.”
Changing the procedure that creates such snafus, however, won’t likely be as straightforward. “We’ve challenged the constitutionality of that process because it doesn’t afford people the process they are due under the constitution,” says the ACLU’s Handeyside. “People aren’t provided with the reasons they are on [the no-fly list], the evidence on them, and it doesn’t give them a life hearing to contest their standing and get off of it.”
At a December hearing regarding a case originally brought in 2010 by 13 people denied the right to fly, ACLU attorney Hina Shamsi charged that being on the no-fly list is no small matter. "This is a day and age in which the 'terrorism threat’ label is a very, very serious one,” she said. “It is perhaps the most stigmatizing one that the government can place on people.”
And the real rub, acknowledges Smullen is that, “There is really nothing one can do to prevent this type of thing from happening.”
(Top photo: Sulemaan Ahmed/Twitter)
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