Farouk Khattab and his wife Manar Younes immigrated to Canada from Egypt in 2019 with the hope of serving their new community of Ottawa.
Both were trained as pharmacists, but Farouk chose to enroll with the Ontario Police College (OPC) with the hopes of helping his neighbours in his new home.
Farouk’s optimism quickly changed however when he began attending the Ottawa Police Service (OPS) Professional Development Centre after completing his OPC program.
“If one of the racialized recruits made a mistake the officers or the instructors responded with mocking, humiliation, harsh treatment, but if the same behavior came from a white recruit or non-racialized recruit, it was overlooked,” Khattab said in an interview with rabble.ca.
After 10 months with the OPS, Khattab was fired in October of 2025. Khattab alleges he was fired due to discrimination and that the OPS used fabricated performance evaluations to justify his termination.
“The very first day after my swearing-in ceremony, OPS claimed that I had ‘performance issues’ — the exact same justification repeatedly used to remove racialized recruits early. Based on this claim, they offered me only 24 hours of training over a period of 40 days,” Khattab wrote in an email to rabble. “Later, an internal Safe Workplace investigation confirmed that this so-called training period was simply a shield to justify a predetermined decision to terminate me.”
Khattab has filed a human rights complaint with the Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario (HRTO).
He is seeking compensation for the violation of his human rights and for lost wages that resulted from his termination.
“During these years Farouk should have been employed with OPS and should have been being paid,” his wife Manar told rabble. “And we hope that the HRTO will have the power to make real changes in OPS to stop this discrimination and harassment.”
OPS responded to a request for comment on rabble and sent the following:
“While we won’t speak to specifics, Mr. Khattab’s allegations brought forward to the Ottawa Police Services Board during his time with the Ottawa Police Service were independently investigated and were not substantiated.
OPS does not tolerate discrimination of any kind.
We expect every member of the Service to uphold these standards, and any allegation of discrimination is taken seriously and reviewed through the appropriate processes.”
Not an isolated experience
Khattab’s experience was not an isolated one unfortunately, according to data collected by the Ethno-Cultural and Religious Diversity (ERD) Employee Resource Group.
According to a report from ERD, new racialized recruits were more than 37 per cent more likely to experience difficulties during the recruit training phase than non-racialized members and were three times more likely to “experience challenges or barriers during recruitment, hiring, and/or recruit training.”
The ERD’s report on use of force training was stark.
“Non-racialized members cited instructor impatience, yelling, and belittling, while racialized members reported biased treatment linked to race, ethnicity, language or accent, and country of origin,” the report reads.
Furthermore, one-in-four racialized members reported experiencing workplace harassment or discrimination.
Of the ERD’s report, the OPS said the following:
“We also fully supported the survey you referenced and encouraged honest participation. The purpose of this work was to better understand member experiences so we can continue to improve. As the Service has become more diverse in a relatively short period of time, we recognize the importance of adapting our culture, supports, and leadership practices to ensure all members feel respected and included. We are carefully reviewing the findings and recommendations and will use them to inform ongoing improvements. This was a valuable and constructive exercise for the Service, and it reinforces our commitment to learning, accountability, and continuing to recruit from the diverse communities we serve.”
The OPS noted that in 2024, over 37 per cent of its new recruits identified as racialized.
“The police say they welcome diverse recruits. But Farouk’s courage in speaking out has helped us learn that what they really do to diverse recruits is abuse and fire them if they don’t conform to OPS culture,” said Robin Browne, coordinator of the 613-819 Black Hub.
A loss of faith in Canada
Farouk and Manar’s experience with OPS has led to them completely losing faith in Canadian institutions and they have made the difficult decision to choose to leave Canada in the near future.
“Unfortunately this experience was hard enough to the extent we lost confidence in the whole system in Canada,” said Manar. “We came here six years ago. We left our country, we left our family, we left everything behind and came here to find a better quality of life for ourselves and most importantly for our kids.”
“When we realized that that’s the reality, the police service in the national capital itself is racist. That was really hard,” Manar went on to say. “Our plan is after completing this fight is to leave Canada.”
Farouk had previously worked at the Shepherd’s of Good Hope in Ottawa, and thought that joining OPS would be another way he could serve his community.
“I was looking for a rewarding career,” he said. “Where every day is different. Every day is like an adventure. I wanted to be a part of a strong organization and a diverse organization, but the reality after I got accepted was completely different.”
Editor’s note: 2026-01-15: This story has been updated with comments provided by the Ottawa Police Service.
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