It is with deepest regret that I write this blog.  We Aussies have really tried to accommodate the Sudanese community who came here for a better life.

Australia is a marvellous country compared with the rest of the world. I should know because I came here as a displaced person.  My family was grateful to be here. My parents worked hard and I studied hard even though we did not know a word of English when we came here.

There was no welfare then, nor the dole,  but we all knuckled down and got on with it. I was seven years old and so was put in Grade 2 in July.  By the end of the year,  the headmaster called my mother to the school and asked if it would be all right if I were promoted to grade 4 the following year instead of grade 3.  In six months I had learned English and managed to skip a year.

I am revealing this because I believe that if you work hard you can achieve a lot. It’s up to you.

That  is why I bristle at the mention of  “disaffected youth”.

In Siberia we were never bored or disaffected.  Life was too precarious for that luxury.

So why am I writing this?

Well,  on the weekend about 200 disaffected Sudanese and Islanders decided to riot in the middle of the city of Melbourne. They spoiled the Moomba Festival in town and made us resent them.

They are bored,  apparently.  They feel disliked.

My question is “What’s there to like?  Their violence?  Their attacks on women?  Their home invasions?  Their selfish and mindless assault on this generous society? ”

My reply is  “If we don’t like you it’s your own bloody fault.”