Vandals have defaced the corflutes of a Liberal Party candidate for the upcoming state election with graffitied penises and swastikas, prompting renewed calls to immediately ban the public display of Nazi symbols.
Donnie Grigau has referred eight campaign signs that were graffitied in the Bellarine electorate on Thursday to Victoria Police and said the vandalism was anti-Semitic, racist and homophobic.
“It’s actually quite upsetting,” said Grigau, who is gay and Asian. “It’s really sad.
“How much more do people have to put up with this? It’s detrimental and harmful.”
In June, Victoria became the first Australian jurisdiction to ban the public display of Nazi symbols, enabling police to remove and confiscate items that breach the ban.
The laws will come into effect in late December, six months after it passed parliament. Those caught intentionally displaying the Nazi swastika in public – including in graffiti – face a maximum of 12 months in jail and a $22,000 penalty.
Deputy Liberal leader David Southwick, who for years campaigned for the swastika’s ban, said if the laws had taken immediate effect, police would have been able to charge the vandals who defaced Grigau’s corflutes.
Southwick said his electorate of Caulfield, which has a large Jewish population, was plastered with swastikas the day the bill passed in June.
Read the article by Rachel Eddie and Sumeyya Ilanbey in The Age.