Zahra Cries Victim After Being Held to His Own Standard

Last night Ahmad Zahra didn’t get what he wanted and today he’s crying on Facebook about it and I couldn’t be laughing harder at that petulant crybully.

First – this is Ahmad Zahra, council member from District 5, on Facebook bemoaning that policy wasn’t followed in snubbing him from the Mayor Pro-Tem seat last night:

Ceremonial selection of Mayor and Pro-Tem you say?

Ok. Let’s do this then. That ceremonial selection is actually outlined in the Fullerton Policy and Procedures Manual as Policy #226. In 2019 is was known as Administrative Policy #37.

It states that Pro-Tem becomes the next Mayor and the Pro-Tem is selected based on who has been on council the longest without having been Mayor.

In 2019 that means that Bruce Whitaker should have been chosen as this year’s Mayor Pro-Tem. Why didn’t that happen? Why was Jan Flory our Mayor Pro-Tem in 2020?

Oh. That’s right. Because Ahmad Zahra decided to vote for a “departure from city policy on the ceremonial selection of Mayor and Mayor Pro Tem”. Here’s the minutes from the meeting in question:

And just because it needs to be hammered home lest Zahra try to weasel out of the official record, here’s the video of Zahra departing from policy to vote for Jan Flory over Whitaker just last year.

Looks like Zahra wants to eat his cake and have it too.

There needs to be a little more context here. We all knew Bruce was going to be Mayor this coming year if he won reelection. Fitzgerald was just Mayor, Silva right before her. Jan Flory promised she wasn’t running for another term on council. The ONLY reason why Bruce wasn’t Pro-Tem this year is because last year’s council majority hates Bruce for having the one thing they cannot stand – principles.

See above principle of consistency being lacking from Zahra.

Instead of following the gentleman’s agreement last year, they shanked Bruce for the sole reason of denying him the ability to put “Re-Elect Mayor Pro-Tem” on his campaign signs in the hopes of knocking him off of council. Thankfully it didn’t matter and he still won reelection.

This is a tactical game that plays out every few years because the Mayor and Pro-Tem tags can swing a few votes here and there.

For Zahra to pretend that he was slighted is laughable because he himself plays in these reindeer games. He just doesn’t like chickens coming home to roost and things not going his way.

This is a perfect example of everybody loving Majority Rule until the majority doesn’t give them what they want.

Let me remind you that in 2019 the council ALSO booted Whitaker off of the Water Board and gave it to newly minted council member Zahra – illegally and also out of spite. There was no reason to boot Whitaker mid-term but politics is petty and water board is a financially lucrative gig.

This time around Zahra wanted to be Mayor Pro-Tem because it positions him for Mayor in 2022 when he’s up for re-election. Provided the ladies from his district shouting to recall him don’t pull off their gambit first of course. There would have been a no-brainer case to vote for him IF he had upheld the agreement last year. He refused. Welcome to turnabout being fair play.

When it came time for the vote last night, Silva nominated Zahra and then Jung nominated Dunlap.

What happened next is both hilarious and sad and yet another example of why Zahra does’t deserve to be Mayor. The second Jung voted for Dunlap, Zahra knew he didn’t have the majority vote on council as there was no way Whitaker would vote for him after the way Zahra has treated him and Dunlap had already voted for himself as he wasn’t going to vote against himself to support Zahra. You can watch the video as Zahra just stares at Jung in disbelief and then abstains from the vote. Sadly right after the vote the video cuts to Whitaker talking so I can’t show you Zahra slamming his stuff down and storming out of the room but you can see him gone when the camera cuts back to the full dais with a missing Zahra.

Ignore Zahra’s preening as he is simply playing the victim hoping that nobody remembers that he once wielded & eagerly used the exact same knife to “skip” somebody in the vote for the ceremonial position of Mayor Pro-Tem.

Things are not going to be easy, financially or otherwise, for our little Hamlet of Malcontents in the coming years. Last night and today’s antics from Zahra and his fellow travelers should prepare us for what lies ahead as they blame everybody but themselves for what plays out.