East London News: Just a few days ago we revealed how the Labour Party had used a headline from the Evening Standard on one of its leaflets. “Mayor’s ‘£500,000 a year’ for aides” sounds like Labour is drawing the public’s attention to a political fact. However, if you read the article under that headline, you find out that it is based on a quote from Tower Hamlets Conservative Councillor Snowdon, who had estimated that the total bill for advisers, consultants and office staff “could be approaching half a million pounds.”
No sooner had we published this, than we find that the Telegraph is in on the act, with an article entitled “Ken Livingstone’s supporters accused of ‘harvesting’ postal ballot papers”. This must have been based on research, because Telegraph journalists were seen going round Spitalfields knocking on doors on polling day. The article produces the fruits of their research: two residents are quoted as stating that supporters of Gulam Robbani collected their postal votes. Two? Yes. Two. Two collections would be wrong, but the Telegraph seems to have realised that they could not base an article on “mass voter manipulation” on two reports, so they have added a third piece of evidence. A “resident took a picture of one of Mr Rahman’s councillors, Aminur Khan, holding a sheaf of papers which the resident said were ballot papers.” The paper then prints Cllr Khan’s statement that he was not collecting ballot papers, but the allegation has been made so the denial leaves the reader with suspicions.
The point of the Telegraph article is not only to have a go at Tower Hamlets but also to have a go at Ken Livingstone in the run up to the election of London Mayor on 3rd May. In a further example of the Snowdon School of Logic, the paper puts a string of statements together: -two people alleged that supporters of Gulam Robbani took their postal votes; -a resident took a photo of Cllr Khan; -Gulam Robbani and Cllr Khan support Lutfur Rahman; -Lutfur Rahman supports Ken Livingstone… … and then you get back to the headline “Ken Livingstone’s supporters accused of ‘harvesting’ postal ballot papers”.
Warning: If there are any “A”-level philosophy students reading this, do not quote the Telegraph article as an example of logic or you will fail your exam.
We digress. If posh papers like the Telegraph can produce articles like this, why should a commoners community paper like ELN be left out? ELN conducted a day’s research in the political corridors of the Borough and, though we’re not quite sure we’ve got the hang of it, you will be astounded to read what we found out. We have had to leave out some of our findings about some of the councillors in this Borough as in the current climate we felt obliged to restrict our comments only to those politicians who are known to have a sense of humour.
Lutfur Rahman takes sharp instrument into Town Hall ELN has been contacted by a sharp-eyed member of staff at the Town Hall, who has revealed that Mayor Lutfur Rahman has been seen in his office wielding a small, thin device which could be an attack weapon. “He calls it a BIRO,” our public-spirited informant told us, “which I believe stands for Bangladeshi Instrument of Reactive Operations. Goodness knows what harm he could do with it if he’s roused. I’ve seen him conduct routine maintenance with it on pieces of paper.” Fears that Mayor Rahman was assembling a whole arsenal of weapons in his town hall bunker were confirmed when he was seen out on exercises with a white triangle encased in a black covering which he was heard referring to as his “FILE”. ELN believes this is an acronym for “Further Instrument of Lutfur’s Extremism”. Mayor Rahman has been seen with this weapon on a number of occasions and it is a worrying trend that he is now obtaining personalised weapons from unknown sources.
Lutfur Rahman seen displaying extremist facial gesture Exclusive: A lengthy ELN investigation has uncovered a frightening gesture which Mayor Lutfur Rahman and his followers are using to send secret messages to one another as they plot their takeover of the Borough.
The gesture has been given the acronym SMILE, but researchers have discovered this is an acronym for the “Specially Malevolent Indication of Lutfur’s Extremism”.
“I am seriously worried about this,” one resident told ELN. “You don’t see it all the time, but when he’s talking to people in this Borough it will suddenly pop out. Sometimes whole crowds of Lutfur’s followers give the game away by displaying the SMILE as soon as they see him.”
Another worried resident told ELN: “This secret coded signal is spreading. More and more people display the SMILE when they see Lutfur Rahman. Who knows where this will lead?”
Lutfur Rahman plans world domination At last ELN can reveal that Lutfur Rahman is planning to run the entire world from the first floor of Mulberry Place. Lip reading experts have studied a still of Lutfur Rahman talking to Ken Livingstone in October 2010 and have confirmed that Rahman gave Livingstone a chilling instruction: “Let’s go over to Whitechapel Market.”
It is well known that the Market is the bedrock institution of capitalism. If these two are to give it a “going over”, this reveals that they are trying to destroy life as we know it in favour of subjecting us to a socialist paradise.
“I am very concerned,” a local opposition politician told us. “Before we know where we are, Mayor Rahman will be coming out of the Town Hall, armed with his BIROS and FILES and exchanging the SMILE with all his supporters. I’m calling for a government inquiry.”