Muslim Vote to support candidates in NSW, Victorian elections

A pro-Palestine political movement that failed to win a seat at the May federal election has vowed to push on and support candidates for the upcoming Victorian and NSW state elections.

The Muslim Vote endorsed independent candidates in three Labor-held seats – Watson and Blaxland in western Sydney and Calwell in Melbourne’s north-west.

Sheikh Wesam Charkawi, convenor of The Muslim Vote, says the group will return for upcoming state elections in Victoria and NSW. Credit: Michael Quelch

Its greatest success was in Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke’s seat of Watson, where independent Ziad Basyouny was the second-most popular candidate on a two-candidate preferred basis.

Burke, who was accused of “vote buying” after holding pre-election mass citizenship ceremonies in Sydney’s culturally diverse western suburbs, still comfortably won the seat, receiving 66 per cent of the vote after preferences were distributed.

In Education Minister Jason Clare’s seat of Blaxland, Ahmed Ouf won 18.76 per cent of first preferences, but the Liberal candidate was second-preferred. In Calwell, Samim Moslih only garnered 6.85 per cent of first preferences.

Despite failing to win a seat, Muslim Vote convenor Sheikh Wesam Charkawi said the results were a “significant step” that “demonstrated the model works”.

In each seat, the independent campaign ate into both Labor and the Liberals’ first preference vote distribution from the 2022 federal election.

“One form of success in the political arena is unseating the sitting minister. Another form is winning hearts and minds of the masses, setting the foundations for future challenges,” Charkawi said.

“We’ve had an avalanche of people reach out to us post-election, either to be candidates or to support our work ... The community isn’t backing down. We all want to continue.”

The Muslim Vote will be supporting Victorian lower house candidates at the 2026 state election, and upper and lower house candidates at the NSW election in 2027, Charkawi said, however their target seats are yet to be determined.

Charkawi said he wanted to build on the result, adding the group had NSW Premier Chris Minns in their sights.

“We aim to challenge [in] many NSW seats,” he said.

Charkawi criticised NSW Labor for its position on the war in Gaza and response to pro-Palestinian protests in Sydney. He said the Minns government had “weaponised police against peaceful protesters, smeared pro-Palestine voices, and pandered to far-right hysteria while Palestinians are slaughtered”.

Electoral analyst Ben Raue believed there were some NSW seats the group could contest based on results from particular booths across Blaxland and Watson.

Basyouny won more than 30 per cent of first preference votes in areas around Greenacre and Punchbowl, within the state seat of Bankstown. Similarly, Ouf won more than 40 per cent of the vote at booths in the state seats of Auburn and Granville.

“There’s potential there,” he said, noting the group would need to move beyond campaigning on a single issue, and engage other communities, as no federal or state seat had a single dominant ethnic community.

“They still have some way to go before they can win,” he said.

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