Tempers at suburban polling booths often become frayed on election day, as volunteers armed with glossy pamphlets make a last desperate bid to get their candidates over the line.
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But a Sydney court has heard that things got out of hand at one south-west Sydney primary school during the last local council elections when Bankstown MP Tania Mihailuk entered the fray to lobby for her politician husband, Alex Kuskoff.
The Bankstown Labor MP is now facing defamation proceedings in the Sydney District Court over allegations that, on September 8, 2012, she told locals not to vote for a minor independent, Rabie Chehade, because one of his cousins was "a drug dealer and a murderer".
"She pointed to his face on the pamphlet and said, 'Don't vote for him, his cousin is a murderer and he's in jail,' " Mr Chehade's brother, Mahmoud, who allegedly witnessed the defamatory comments, told the court.
Mahmoud Chehade claimed that when he confronted the MP, she shouted, "I can say what I want!" and then: "What are you going to do? Get your cousins to come and kill me?"
Liberal Party volunteer Mehmet Ali Kay told the court he witnessed Ms Mihailuk's alleged spray and intervened to stand up for Mr Chehade.
"She said, 'Do you know who I am?' " Mr Kay said.
"I said, 'I don't know who you are.'
"She said, 'I'm the state MP.'
"I said, 'OK, you're the state MP but you can't talk like that. If you have power, use that power in the Parliament, not here.' "
Shortly after, Mr Kay said, a "very large man" came over and said: "Look, mate, you can't speak to the MP like that."
"He said, 'Wait here, I'm going to come back and break your mouth, you wait out here at 6 o'clock. I'm going to break your fingers,' " Mr Kay said.
Rabie Chehade told the court that Ms Mihailuk's comments, which he alleges were made on at least one other occasion throughout the day, had effectively "ruined" him.
"It's no good for my reputation – I've lived in the area my whole life," he said.
"I've had my wife question me – my in-laws ask whether it's true that my family are murderers or drug dealers … I've had threats where I wasn't aware where it came from.
"On a business level, I've had friends in the real estate industry asking the question. I've got to explain myself instead of doing my job."
After the election, in which Mr Kuskoff won a seat on the council and Mr Chehade lost, the latter's solicitor contacted Ms Mihailuk to demand an apology.
She refused, and maintains that she never made the comments.
"These proceedings are nothing more than a joke to you, aren't they?" the MP's barrister, Peter Lange, said to Mr Chehade during cross examination.
"No, they're not a joke," he replied.
"I suggest that this is a blunt attempt to smear a sitting member of parliament, and that you made up your evidence here today," Mr Lange continued.
"Absolutely not," Mr Chehade replied.
The hearing continues.
