Saera Khan
Saera Tithi Khan (born April 23, 1979 in Oslo) is a Bangladeshi-Norwegian politician for the Labour Party.
She was elected to the Norwegian Parliament from Oslo in 2005. She had previously served as a deputy representative during the term 2001–2005. She was the only member of the Storting of immigrant background, until October 2007 when Akhtar Chaudhry took another of the Oslo seats.
On the local level she was a member of Oslo city council from 1999 to 2005.
[edit] 2008 psychic phone call controversy
Controversy erupted in late September 2008 when it was revealed that Khan had racked up extremely high phone bills using the mobile phone with which she was provided for free by the Parliament.[1] The president of the Storting, Thorbjørn Jagland, refused to pay these phone bills because of the extremely large amounts involved.[1] First, Khan claimed that the reason for the high bills was that she had called her family abroad.[2] When this was shown to be false, she instead claimed that she had a boyfriend who was a special operations soldier, and that the phone bills originated from satellite telephone calls to this boyfriend,[3] triggering an investigation by the Norwegian Army because Norwegian soldiers are not allowed to receive private satellite calls while on duty. The result of this investigation was that the Army denied that Khan's boyfriend was a Norwegian soldier, upon which Khan told media that the alleged boyfriend was attached to the British ISAF force,[4] and that his identity could not be disclosed for security reasons.[5] The British Ministry of Defence subsequently denied[6] that soldiers in the ISAF force were allowed to receive satellite phone calls. Following these revelations, Khan admitted that the phone bills were not due to overseas satellite calls, but rather from calls to Norwegian premium-rate numbers offering psychic advice services.[7][8] The morning after these revelations, October 8, Khan went on sick leave[9] and announced later in the day that she is resigning as candidate for the 2009 parliamentary elections.[10] Khan has repaid the part of her phone bills that exceeds reasonable use for a member of Parliament.[7]
The BBC reported on 10 October 2008 [11] that she had made 793 calls and that "her calls became so frequent that many fortune-tellers told her to stop ringing".
In a curious turn of events, the Norwegian soap opera "Hotel Cæsar" had a plot line about a person calling psychic advisers on his employer's expense only weeks before reports of Khan's phone use appeared in the press.
[edit] Notes
- ^ a b Ryste, Camilla (2008-09-24). "Stortingsrepresentant hadde skyhøy mobilregning". Aftenposten. http://www.aftenposten.no/nyheter/iriks/politikk/article2672196.ece. Retrieved 2008-10-09.
- ^ "Må betale mobilregningene selv". Dagbladet. NTB. 2008-09-24. http://www.dagbladet.no/nyheter/2008/09/24/547952.html. Retrieved 2008-10-09.
- ^ Nordseth, Pål (2008-10-05). "Kjæresten er spesialsoldat i utlandet". Dagbladet. http://www.kjendis.no/2008/10/05/549194.html. Retrieved 2008-10-09.
- ^ Thorkilsen, Joakim (2008-10-08). "– Kjæresten finnes ikke". Dagbladet. http://www.kjendis.no/2008/10/08/549612.html. Retrieved 2008-10-09.
- ^ Andersen, Mads A.; Sun Iren Bjørnås (2008-10-08). "Saera Khan om soldatkjæresten: – Han er i det britiske forsvaret". VG. http://www.vg.no/nyheter/innenriks/norsk-politikk/artikkel.php?artid=517112. Retrieved 2008-10-09.
- ^ Bryne, Silje (2008-10-08). "– Forbudt å bruke privat satelittelefon". Dagbladet. http://www.kjendis.no/2008/10/08/549626.html. Retrieved 2008-10-09.
- ^ a b Bryne, Silje (2008-10-08). "Ringte spåkoner likevel". Dagbladet. http://www.kjendis.no/2008/10/08/549643.html. Retrieved 2008-10-09.
- ^ Johannessen, Randi (2008-10-08). "Innrømmer at hun ringte til klarsynte". Aftenposten. http://www.aftenposten.no/nyheter/iriks/article2702122.ece. Retrieved 2008-10-09.
- ^ Pettersen, Charlott Lokland; Pål Nordseth (2008-10-09). "Saera er sykemeldt". Dagbladet. http://www.kjendis.no/2008/10/09/549695.html. Retrieved 2008-10-09.
- ^ Magnus, Gunnar; Geir Salvesen, Stine Barstad (2008-10-09). "Khan tar ikke gjenvalg". Aftenposten. http://www.aftenposten.no/nyheter/iriks/article2703665.ece. Retrieved 2008-10-09.
- ^ "Norway MP called fortune-tellers". BBC News. 2008-10-10. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7662908.stm. Retrieved 2010-05-23.
[edit] References
- "Saera Khan" (in Norwegian). Stortinget.no. http://www.stortinget.no/no/Representanter-og-komiteer/Representantene/Representantfordeling/Representant/?perid=STK&tab=Biography.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
