"Online abuse and verbal insults remain routine for the first former refugee to be elected to local government in New Zealand, but he will not flinch to racism.
Orphee Mickalad, 32, doesn’t just have time commitments and career ambitions to weigh up when considering if he should seek re-election to the city council in Palmerston North in October, there is also the toll of unrelenting prejudice.
“I experience racism almost every day,” he said. “I’ll walk past a traffic light and someone will yell, ‘go back to your own country’, and drive off.”
Mickalad is no stranger to living among hostility. He and his family escaped war in Congo for a new life in New Zealand when he was 15. He went from speaking little English to winning a seat on council in a 2021 by-election."