The East London Advertiser has published a statement from Abjol Miah, the former leader of the Respect group on Tower Hamlets council and a member of its ruling council. Although it’s aimed primarily at the Tower Hamlets scene, there is an interesting undertone to it. In fact, it was probably written by Rob Hoveman, who is one of George Galloway’s closest advisers and is, to coin a phrase, as cunning as a fox who’s just been appointed Professor of Cunning at Oxford University.
In the article, Rob – er, sorry, I mean Abjol – tries to align Lutfur Rahman, and to a degree, Respect, with Ed Miliband. Given the controversy surrounding Lutfur’s links and friends, that’s something I don’t think the new Labour leader would agree with.
Here’s an excerpt:
As for Helal Abbas, he has never admitted that some of Labour’s policies in the past which he carried out were very damaging to people in Tower Hamlets. Helal Abbas is the “old generation” whereas Ed Miliband and Lutfur Rahman are the “new generation”.
This is very important. I have my disagreements with Ed Miliband and the jury is out on how good a leader he may ultimately be. But there were important things in his maiden speech, as leader, to the Labour Party conference that most people can agree with.
I’m not even sure Lutfur himself would agree. Rob and Abjol don’t seem to have done their homework: according to David Miliband’s campaign website, Lutfur backed the elder brother for the Labour leadership.
His name appears at number 23, one below Helal Abbas and one above Ohid Ahmed. What a confused bunch they all are.
(There’s more in the ELA article that I’ll write about in another post.)
