How to make a martyr out of a molehill

Immigration Minister Alex Hawke based his deportation order of Novak Djokovic on another concern – that people may ‘perceive’ him to have risky views against vaccinations. What a rotten precedent.

In his book, Say Nothing, The Murder and Memory of Northern Ireland, Patrick Radden Keefe recounts one of the more curious ways Margaret Thatcher dealt with Gerry Adams when he was a Sinn Fein MP in Westminster. Apparently threatened by the power of ideological seduction, Thatcher banned the sound of the IRA and Sinn Fein from the airwaves. This peculiar rule meant Adams could be seen on TV and speaking to radio, but his voice was prohibited. It was a monumentally stupid restriction. Soon enough, broadcasters employed actors to dub the former IRA leader’s voice whenever he appeared on the airwaves. Rather than shut down Adams, this drew attention to him whenever he spoke.

Let’s be clear: Novak Djokovic is no Gerry Adams. Not even close. And lord knows Scott Morrison is no Margaret Thatcher. But dissent and state power frequently rub up against each other and leaders of varying abilities across the ages, even in democracies, have come up with ways to use their power to deal with dissent.

Those who crack down on dissent can be prone to illogical overreaction, often for base political purposes. For example, India, the world’s largest democracy, blocked access to the internet in late 2019 in Kashmir for months, arguing it was trying to avoid “the permanent loss of life”. What loss of life is not permanent? Like I said, logic is not a hot commodity when governments are trying to crack down on dissent.

Deporting Novak Djokovic reveals the Morrison government’s attitude to power. If you’ve got it, use it, especially for brazen political purposes.

Covid became the perfect vehicle to shut down dissenters, with governments across the country catastrophising on the grounds of health. State governments banned lockdown protests in the name of safety, while allowing Black Lives Matter protests. A pregnant woman who posted something naughty on social media was arrested in the name of public safety.

Even as the country enjoys one of the highest vaccination rates in the world, the Immigration Minister’s decision to deport Djokovic has showcased the Morrison government’s attitude to dissent and the brute force of state power. In the process, it made a martyr out of a molehill.

Alex Hawke didn’t deport Djokovic for having a dodgy visa that relied on faulty medical exemptions or factual errors on his arrival documents. Hawke told the Federal Court he ordered the deportation because of the tennis player’s beliefs about vaccination, claiming his presence would whip up anti-vax sentiment. In other words, Hawke chose to advertise the federal government’s attitude to dissent.

Whether you agree with a person who chooses not to get vaccinated or not – and I don’t – it is not yet illegal to be unvaccinated. Until that happens, there ought to be room in a democracy for idiots, even for foreign ones. But then, Morrison has never been a great friend of free speech, unless it involved playing footsies with opinionated backbenchers to maintain his wafer-thin majority.

Deporting Djokovic also reveals the Morrison government’s attitude to power. If you’ve got it, use it, especially for brazen political purposes. Hawke’s written statement to the Federal Court was so lightweight in its submissions and evidence that it clearly dared the court to interfere with the power of the minister to deport Djokovic

And the Federal Court on Sunday didn’t dare intervene. The full bench of the court held that Hawke’s deportation order was legal under the wide personal discretion vested under sections 133 and 116 of the Migration Act, enacted in 2014.

Legal, yes. But the court’s decision doesn’t render the minister’s decision sensible or logical or fair for the simple reason that those factors are irrelevant to the minister’s exercise of state power.

What makes this case interesting is that Hawke didn’t need to state his reasons. But through his legal team, the minister quoted a BBC article to the court to prove Djokovic’s opposition to vaccination. The minister didn’t bother quoting the rest of what the tennis player said in that April 2020 interview – that as he was “no expert” he would keep an “open mind” and “wanted the option to choose what’s best for my body”.

In fact, section 133 of the Migration Act expressly exempts the minister’s decision from the ordinary rules of natural justice. Out goes audi alteram parte, Latin for “hear the other side”. Out goes nemo debet esse judex in propria sua causa, meaning “no one shall be judge of his own case”.

Therefore, Hawke didn’t have to table evidence that Djokovic’s presence at other tournaments had whipped up anti-vax sentiment. It was also irrelevant to ask other logical questions of the minister. If Djokovic’s presence was that dangerous to the country, why wasn’t Hawke more vigilant in refusing him entry in the first place?

Didn’t the government’s deportation decisions to kick out Djokovic stir up anti-vaxxers, rather than the tennis player’s arrival into the country? After all, he wasn’t planning a countrywide tour to speak against vaccination. He came to play tennis.

The Immigration Minister based his deportation order on another concern – that people may “perceive” Djokovic to have risky views against vaccinations. What a rotten precedent, holding a person responsible for how others may perceive them. If this is the upshot of the minister’s so-called God-like powers, it explains why I’m an atheist.

Deporting Djokovic is worthy of a chapter in any new book about the Morrison government because it points to how Morrison is willing to exert border powers, stifling dissent with phony claims of safety, to win the 2022 election.

As the Prime Minister told Ben Fordham on Monday morning, “It’s not our first rodeo, Ben”. That’s true. As a former immigration minister, Morrison understands the politics of borders better than most. The difference is that as immigration minister Morrison had a running rail – a clear instruction from then prime minister Tony Abbott to destroy the evil people-smuggling business model. And he did just that. It was a difficult and ultimately sensible policy.

Calling the shots as PM, Morrison is prone to the reactive politics of populism over carefully considered policy. And why would he change tune now? The country has been conditioned at state and federal levels with fear and hysteria for more than two years. If Australians feared the brute force of state power more than the arrival of an unvaccinated tennis player, the federal government would be more measured. Because the PM would sniff that wind, too.