Unless I missed it, Tower Hamlets Mayor Lutfur Rahman made no comment on his blog of the 10th anniversary of 9/11 two years ago.
Last year, again nothing.
This year, today, he (or a minion) has written this:
Remembering 9/11
The names of the three thousand victims of the 9/11 attack on the World Trade Center in New York, are being read out today to mark the twelfth anniversary.
It is worth recalling that the victims included people from all walks of life, many nationalities and many faiths. The attack on the World Trade Center changed history; the war in Iraq and the continuing conflict in Afghanistan can trace their beginnings to that one terrible event. So today is also the day when we should remember the casualties of all wars and hope that the terrible civil war raging in Syria can be ended through diplomacy and through yet more war and destruction (sic).
In recalling the innocent people who lost their lives on 9/11, we should never forget the role played by the emergency services, the fire-fighters and the New York Police Department on that terrible day. Their often heroic role reminds me why it is so important to continue to fight attempts to cut back vital public services here and why we need to re-double our efforts to tell Mayor Boris Johnson that cuts cost lives.
Politics should be about sound judgement.
Lutfur just can’t help himself, can he.
Trial by Jeory 
What does he mean by “and hope that the terrible civil war raging in Syria can be ended through diplomacy AND through yet more war and destruction”?? Does this mean Lutfar actively seeks war and destruction alongside diplomacy? Confused by this sentence…
Living under Lutfur is special. You’re lucky enough to observe the unique wonder of a man falling helplessly in love with the smell of his own farts.
Living under the man you should be used to the smell of his farts too then?
To Nicky,
My answer is “illiteracy” and “slovenliness” are characteristic Trade Marks of the current Mayor and his expensive public provided support system (advisers, deputies and the whole of the LBTH including lawyers, Spin Doctors, Media experts and Communications experts …. and the car/taxi perks).
If the Mayor doesn’t care about his public statements, how can anyone be sure he genuinely means all his other public utterances ?
We should all trace the history back the the terrible event when a man in the desert 1400 years ago started telling people he was receiving ‘divine messages’ and everybody must do as he says
Which history are you talking about ‘get real’?
I think it should have said “AND NOT..”. I don’t think a typo will bring him down. Regrettably his control of the Sylheti media and his widely distributed weekly colour photo album (aka East End Life) make him look unsinkable. But then again they said that about the Titanic.
Cut him some slack it’s a typo people make them ? Don’t think he needed to commnet but elections coming up i suppose.
Could you imagine John Biggs using 9/11 like that?
No I don’t think John would use 9/11 like that but the Typo is different from political opportunism.
The speeches against the EDL were opportunistic and a way of bolstering credentials ahead of an election both camps are guilty of that. More so the Mayor. This example is just particularly unedifying.
To think Axel Landin gets paid to write this rubbish…
Anyway, I thought the Islamist trope was that the Joos did 9/11? Turns out they think it was Boris Johnson. Well, it’s a theory.
Does Axel still do it? I thought he had parted company with the TH regime to focus on politicking within rather than outside the Labour Party (not through any principled disagreement sadly)? I may well be wrong as I pay only occasional attention from out of borough. A very cack-handed dig that hits totally the wrong note in any case. How does the author think those who are not lefty politicos think about tragedies of this sort?!
Sadly this is another example of our ‘Mayor’ Rahman’s atrocious use, this time of the thousands who died in 9/11 for his own political advantage. Does he have any sense of decency at all? These people didn’t die just to give Rahman a political edge! This was a tragic terrorist attack on innocent people, and those who died or were injured deserve to be remembered appropriately.
These sort of pronouncements on world events are usually reserved for heads of state, religious leaders and ‘global statesmen’; people like the Dalai Lama, the Pope, the Queen, former presidents etc.
Does this list include the leaders of local authorities? Perhaps the Mayor of New York but beyond that, no. Lutfur clearly has ideas above his station. He appears quite deluded and perhaps this is even of fantasist thinking where he imagines he has some great role to play in the world.
The problem is WE all take notice of what he says. it is like responding to the text messages of someone who is clearly mad, telling you about the latest insane conspiracy theory they have seen on YouTube.
Lutfur should stop making these ridiculous and clumsy announcements and focus on the matters which befit his station, the leader of a borough council.
Here are some suggestions of the sort of things he could concentrate on:
Solutions to stop members of the public being forced to piss and shit on the pavements because all the public toilets have been sold,
Initiatives to reduce the rampant gang violence afflicting local Bangladeshi youth which has recently resulted in an innocent young men being stabbed to death and over the years has left many old people in this borough too afraid to leave their homes.
Explore ways to encourage racial integration such as eradicating expensive translation services which prevent people from moving out of the borough (and lead to ghettoisation) and support initiatives which encourage people from different backgrounds to share services and interact.
Take action to combat the tuberculosis health crisis developing in Bangladeshi communities in LBTH and Camden. He could consider educating people among his own community about how tuberculosis is spread and use his THEOs to punish those who insist on chewing betel nut and spitting it out on the pavement
In short he could be actually dealing with the things he is put there to deal with and not pretending he is the reincarnation of Princess Diana.
What do you want? You condemn him when he doesn’t mention 9/11 and then when he does you condemn him again.
His blog has to be relevant to the voters of East London and by drawing parallels with the heroic actions of firefighters in New York and firefighters in London he achieves that.
It seems to me Ted that your whipping stick hits in only one direction which does your blog no justice at all or do you think the firefighters in London are underserving of public support?
Thanks for your first comment, Yvonne. I didn’t condemn him when he made no comment in 2011 or 2012.
I can’t imagine anywhere else in Britain where the horrors of 9/11 are more relevant than the East End. Blitz, IRA bombs, Canary Wharf and Cantor Fitzgerald, 7/7 and Aldgate…
Your final sentence does your sharp, intelligent Sunday Express trained brain no justice at all.
Lutfur could and should have saved his firefighter comments for another day.
Lutfur is completely out of his depth as mayor. He’s not particularly intelligent. Look at the many cronies he has to protect him in the town hall and the constant threat of legal action that is threatened by his clique against opponents. It paints a picture of a very paranoid and insecure individual