East London News: An anonymous leaflet – packed with lies and innuendo – circulated just before the poll in Spitalfields & Banglatown is thought to have contributed to a last minute drop in votes for Independent candidate Gulam Robbani – and may have boosted the vote of veteran Labour candidate Ala Uddin.
The leaflet is thought to be in breach of election law, as it did not carry a formal imprint declaring who had produced it. The leaflet has a very basic design and looks at first sight as if it has been knocked together by amateurs. However, the use of shadow speech boxes and columns indicates it is more likely to have been put together by a more sophisticated, experienced designer, who has kept it simple to make it look like a kitchen table production. The language is simple, which again makes it stand out from the sort of leaflet produced by political parties. It contains various mistakes and muddles, but much of it is virtually without spelling or punctuation mistakes. It looks like the leaflet is the work of an experienced hand who is trying to make it look like the product of grassroots activists.
ELN does not want to repeat the lies and libels contained in this leaflet, but we are displaying it so that you can see it for yourselves. As you read through the leaflet, you can see that the content is actually quite sophisticated, taking the reader through a list of allegations and smears and building the case for why they should go out and vote for the Labour candidate.
Some of the lies and innuendo
Innuendo: Tower Hamlets is run by an elected Mayor whose powers amount to an elected dictatorship. The facts: The elected Mayor has exactly the same powers as the elected Councillors used to have. Under the old system, these powers were held by the largest political party and its leader. The Mayor was chosen in an election which all voters in the Borough could take part in; the Council Leader in previous Administrations was only elected by the Councillors in his/her political party. Labour has been the largest political party and has run the Council since 1994, and for the last two elections its candidates have all been chosen by party officials who don’t even live in the Borough (with additional advice from Graham Taylor).
Lie: Shelina Akhtar was allocated her council flat by Lutfur Rahman. The facts: Of course Mayor Rahman doesn’t allocate Council flats. All social housing flats are allocated under the terms of the allocation policy: no mayor or councillor has any influence over individual allocations.
Lie: Mayor Rahman has “special relationships” with certain women and allocates housing to them. The facts: This is a clearly libellous statement. Mayor Rahman has two special women in his life: his wife and his daughter – end of. A look at Mayor Rahman’s diary would make it quite clear that he doesn’t have any time for any other “special relationships”: the man may be the elected mayor, but he’s not superhuman. Mayor Rahman has a mandate from the whole electorate: why would he need to seek approval from individual women? Mayor Rahman has the office he wanted and a host of policies to implement: why would he want to jeopardise all that by allocating a few homes? He’s too busy tackling the housing crisis the whole Borough is suffering from.
Lie: More and more ghost voters are appearing on the register of electors. The facts: Tower Hamlets electoral register is compiled in accordance with the laws of the land, in the same way as is done across the UK. The idea that the electoral register includes ghost voters is being peddled by those who want to discredit the Mayor and discredit Tower Hamlets. In the largely white Home Counties, there are probably several households who keep sons and daughter on the electoral register while they are away at university – and get postal votes for them. No one suggests these people are fiddling the vote. In Tower Hamlets, with a large Bangladeshi population, the allegation of vote fiddling comes naturally to those who see people of Asian origin as second class.
Innuendo: Mayor Rahman replaces the fraudulent candidate Shelina Akhtar… The facts: Mayor Rahman was never involved in selecting Shelina Akhtar as a candidate. Ms Akhtar was vetted for suitability by the Labour Party, and she won her seat in Spitalfields as a Labour candidate before Tower Hamlets even had an elected Mayor. Cllr Akhtar’s frauds began before the mayoral election – before Lutfur Rahman stood as an independent candidate and, therefore, before she decided to endorse him in the mayoral election. What is it about Labour Party candidate vetting and selection procedures that led them to back to the hilt a woman who went on to commit fraud?
Innuendo: There is only one candidate with a chance of defeating Robbani. The facts: This is a clear echo of the statement in Labour’s eve of poll leaflet: “Only Labour can beat ‘Respect’-backed Rahman’s candidate tomorrow…”. The implication that those who read the lies and innuendo in the anonymous leaflet should vote Labour is clear.
The day this leaflet was circulated in Spitalfields was a sad day for democracy. This kind of intervention in an election is not what we need in Tower Hamlets. The people deserve better.
ELN has only answered a selection of the lies and innuendo in this leaflet. We shall add to this list as we establish more facts which refute the allegations. We shall also be asking the political parties for their comments on this leaflet. Check back soon.
Click on the images of the leaflets to view full size.