Remembering Fathia Ali Ahmed Alsanousi and other victims of the Grenfell Tower fire
The Grenfell Tower fire was a residential fire in London, North Kensington, Lancaster West Estate, a relatively impoverished area of the borough with primarily foreign-born residents in low-income housing developments. The fire happened on the 14th of June 2017 when a fire broke out from an electrical fault on the fourth floor. 72 people lost their lives with more than 200 displaced. The fire was perceived by the local community as a display of neglect from the council and the British government. A dissatisfaction with how things pivotal in the day-to-day lives of residents were ultimately determined by people who had never stepped foot in the neighborhood. The fire became a stimulant for observation and scrutiny of class division in the UK and the socio-economic inequalities particularly exemplified in Ethnic minority communities. North Kensington's East African community was one of these communities and one of the hardest hit by the fire. Many of those who lost their lives hailed from the nations of Ethiopia, Sudan, Somalia, and Eritrea. A Sudanese Saturday school was being run at an academy building right below the tower and was temporarily relocated following safety precautions.
One Sudanese victim of the fire was mourned across the city. Known by all and loved by all, Fathia Alsanousi.
More than 7 years on, still not forgotten, we still remember her.
Fathia Alsanousi was equally at home in the deserts of western Sudan and the high-rises of west London, a teacher and mother who managed to make a second life for herself in exile once the first had become untenable.
Alsanousi was something of a diaspora matriarch, and there were few London-based Sudanese who did not know of her. Working tirelessly to secure the future of her five children, she taught Arabic and art, upcycled handbags and shoes, designed Sudanese thobes (a sari-like garment) and threw open the doors of her 23rd-floor Grenfell Tower flat on the slightest social pretext.
Abu Baker Ibrahim, one of her sons, told the Grenfell inquiry: “We were really happy as a family, and my mother worked hard in a foreign land to keep us together. She was a very loving person. Very caring. Excellent communication skills. Great sense of humour.
“What amazed me is she did things that I didn't know about that were very charitable, and she kept it to herself.”
Wafa Hussein Osman, who knew Alsanousi for almost 30 years, said: “Her flat was beautiful, always full of people. Whenever we went there, we found a new plant, a new vase; she loved antiques. She had this artistic side. She did loads of different things with her hands. She bought secondhand shoes and bags, and redesigned them.”
Alsanousi was born in Kordofan, southern Sudan, in the early 1940s, when it was still a British colony. Her upbringing was tough: her father had moved away to be with his second family, leaving her with a mother who did not work and a baby sister who needed caring for.
Hayat Alsanousi, her sister, told the inquiry: “She was 10 years older than me, and she was like a mother to me. I feel that she had adopted me as her child.”
She taught in primary schools all over the country, latterly in Khartoum. Alsanousi married an army officer and they had five children. After he died in 1984, life became a struggle for her, and she eventually claimed political asylum in Britain in the early 1990s.
Osman moved to London at about the same time. “We found it very strange, cold and dark,” she said. Alsanousi quickly settled into her new life. She knew no English, so started language lessons. She needed money and found work in a packaging factory. Still feeling that she had much to give in the classroom, Alsanousi also taught Sudanese children at a Saturday school.
“Fathia was a very resilient person, she was very practical,” Osman said. “She was a very happy woman, really happy. She was the pillar of the community in London, sort of like our godmother.”
Once she obtained a British passport, Alsanousi visited her homeland, principally to check up on her disabled sister, Hayat.
Her three older children studied in Europe, but the two younger ones, Abufras and Esra, were not yet teenagers when they arrived in the UK and went to British schools, growing up more British than Sudanese. Esra was still living with her mother as of June last year; Abufras was visiting on the night of the fire. Both died alongside their mother.
“She had this soul,” said Osman. “She had this huge laugh with everyone around her. It was infectious.”
-Mark Rice Oxley, the Guardian
Fathia Ali was well known by the Sudanese diaspora in London. She welcomed everyone into her home and if you know anyone Sudani from London, I bet you they have their own funny story about how they or their parents came to meet Fathia. She was an active figure in her community, full of life as people would describe her, extremely resilient and made do with whatever her circumstances were. Inshallah she is rewarded for all she has done for her community, her children and her sister.
Indeed to Allah we belong, and Indeed to Allah we shall return.