LABOUR’S RUSHANARA ALI has dismissed Ajmal Masroor’s challenge to her as “confusing” and told him to go and stand for election somewhere else.
Rushanara Ali, the outgoing Labour MP for Bethnal Green & Bow, is Labour’s official candidate in the seat in the current General Election. Ajmal Masroor contested the seat at the 2010 General Election, as the Liberal Democrat candidate, and he is standing again – this time as an Independent candidate.
Speaking to Channel S, Ms Ali said, “Well look, everybody has the right to stand in an election and he is exercising his right to stand as a candidate. But he stood as a Liberal Democrat against me in 2010 and now he’s standing as an independent and I think that is confusing.”
Mr Masroor had hinted earlier, in his own press conference, that Ms Ali’s constituents might see her own party loyalties as confusing. He pointed out that Rushanara Ali signed a motion of no confidence in Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership of the Labour Party and cast doubt on whether she would support the elected Labour Leader to be Prime Minister.
Ms Ali also told Channel S that she wanted Ajmal out of her seat in Bethnal Green, saying, “I think that if he stuck with the Lib Dems and stood in another area, that would have been good for our community because although it is not the same party as my party, I think that people in our community being in mainstream politics is a good thing – but I don’t think it is a good thing when people leave the mainstream and then become independent.”
Mr Masroor had earlier told the press that he was standing in order that voters who feel that the mainstream political parties do not represent them could have a choice at the ballot box. He was offering electors the opportunity to vote for someone who clearly, with no confusion, would support Jeremy Corbyn’s ten-point policy programme. He confirmed that, if elected, he would support a Jeremy Corbyn-led Labour Government.
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