Khaldoun Asfour is an Australian politician and former Mayor of the

City of Canterbury-Bankstown Canterbury-Bankstown Council, trading as the City of Canterbury Bankstown and stylised as CBCity, is a Local government areas of New South Wales, local government area in the Canterbury-Bankstown region of Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. Th ...

, the largest

local government area A local government area (LGA) is an administrative division of a country that a local government is responsible for. The size of an LGA varies by country but it is generally a subdivision of a federated state, state, province, division (politica ...

New South Wales New South Wales (commonly abbreviated as NSW) is a States and territories of Australia, state on the Eastern states of Australia, east coast of :Australia. It borders Queensland to the north, Victoria (state), Victoria to the south, and South ...

by population, and fourth most-populous local government in

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

. He previously served as a councillor for the

City of Bankstown The City of Bankstown was a Local government in Australia, local government area in the South-western Sydney, south-west region of Sydney, Australia, centred on the suburb of Bankstown, from 1895 to 2016. The last mayor of the City of Bankstow ...

from 2004 to 2016, serving as its mayor from 2011 to 2014 and again from 2015 to 2016.

Career

Asfour is a member of the

Australian Labor Party The Australian Labor Party (ALP), also known as the Labor Party or simply Labor, is the major Centre-left politics, centre-left List of political parties in Australia, political party in Australia and one of two Major party, major parties in Po ...

, and publicly announced his intention to nominate as the party's endorsed candidate for the New South Wales state seat of Lakemba for the

2015 New South Wales state election The 2015 New South Wales state election was held on Saturday 28 March 2015. Members were elected to all 93 seats in the Legislative Assembly using optional preferential voting. Members were also elected to 21 of the 42 seats in the Legislative ...

. He was not successful, with the party choosing eventual MP

Jihad Dib Jihad Dib (born 1973) is an Australian politician. Early life and career Dib was born in Lebanon and migrated to Australia with his family when he was two years old. He began his career as a teacher at Ulladulla High School. He was principal of ...

without a local pre-selection contest taking place. In 2018, Asfour announced that the City of Canterbury-Bankstown would establish a pilot program to provide free childcare to all local asylum seeker families in its council-run centres, the first program of its kind in Australia. In 2022, Asfour was accused of being an acolyte for corrupt politician Eddie Obeid by fellow Labor MP Tania Mihailuk in State Parliament. Following the claims, Asfour was investigated by an independent party and was subsequently cleared of any wrongdoing in January 2023.

References

Living people Mayors of Bankstown Deputy mayors of places in Australia Year of birth missing (living people) {{Australia-mayor-stub