By Elliott West
“Keir Starmer, this is for Gaza,” he said. “You will pay a high price for the role that you have played in enabling, encouraging and covering for the catastrophe presently going on in occupied Gaza, in the Gaza Strip”.
George Galloway
Introduction
George Galloway is a divisive figure, a politician who gains the vote by hoodwinking the electorate a shopping list of promises that he knows that he can’t ultimately deliver on. This comeback king who once acted out being a cat licking milk from a bowl at the feet of Rula Lenska on Celebrity Big Brother, has seized on the opportunity of a political implosion in Rochdale to peddle his rhetoric and win the seat with a an almost 6,000 majority. A seat that sadly became vacant after the loss of Sir Tony Lloyd.
Labour could have won this seat easily but made a fatal mistake. It rushed the selection process and didn’t vet the candidate properly. So it ended up with a Labour councillor who bought into the vile theories anti-semitism and verbalised them in the campaign. The party hierarchy looked weak by taking 48 hours to deselect the candidate. By which time, it was too late to remove Azhar Ali from the ballot paper. So his name remained with Labour next to it.
The Political Magician
George Galloway is someone who loves to attack and has a deep rooted hate of the Labour Party. A party that he once represented but was ultimately expelled from in 2003 for his prominent opposition to the Iraq war. It would be quite easy to buy into his political beliefs if you were disillusioned by the state of British politics and by homing in on the Gazza conflict, he has picked up a large number of votes. Galloway has a track record of protest politics dating back to the two Iraq wars and when he has not been in Westminster, shouts from the pulpit sidelines. A disciple of old Labour, George has hated the direction that the party has lurched to. A massive critic of Tony Blair and Sir Keir Starmer, this wealthy politician portrays himself as a crusader for the working class, flitting from the Respect Party to his own formed party, the Workers Party of Britain. He even joined the London mayoral election in 2016 and came seventh.
The Dangers of Galloway
“This is going to spark a movement, a landslide, a shifting of the tectonic plates, a score of parliamentary constituencies, beginning here in the north-west, in the West Midlands, in London, from Ilford to Bethnal Green and Bow”.
George Galloway
This Dundee born MP will only have one thing on his mind when he sits on the backbenchers. He wants to cause mayhem and make the most of the little time he has before a general election is called. Be under no doubt that this feisty Scotsman will be a needle in the side of the Labour Party and will use every opportunity to attack them from the back benches. A man who is no stranger to verbal and physical attacks and will heighten even further the need for MPs of all political persuasions to feel safe doing their job.
He returns after unseating his former party four times and representing his fourth constituency in 37 years. A one man band who aims to burrow under the political landscape and set off fireworks of opinion. He is a potential danger but his political momentum has to be swatted before it goes into free fall. A politician who will be emboldened by winning 12,335 votes-39.7 of the total vote in Rochdale and giving him a 5,697 vote majority. Throughout his campaign, Galloway bombarded the Rochdale electorate with campaign leaflets that aimed to attract voters with conflicting messages and attacks on Starmer.
Labour’s response of Galloway winning because Labour didn’t stand will wear thin. It’s a flimsy excuse that the Scotsman and the Conservative Party will be keen to capitalise on. To say that you will put a first class candidate up at the general election is a knee jerk reaction and if they don’t watch out, the damage could already be done. George Galloway won in the midst of a political mess and used intimidation to win it. A person who refuses to accept the state of Israel. The last time he won in Bradford West in 2012, Labour whips refused to give him an office and he set up a table in Portcullis House. A lone voice and an attention seeker, a pariah and conspiracy theorist.
Afterthoughts
George Galloway’s victory in Rochdale will send a seismic shockwave through politics. His aim is to field a number of candidates at the general election and grow his party. It’s a pipe dream but if politicians are not too careful, could loom as a reality. This is hate politics in its most vile form and must be stamped out before it gets out of control. Galloway is a brilliant orator but that’s as far as it goes. He is not the answer to our problems as he wants us to believe and uses rhetoric to disguise his empty promises and complete lack of policies. He rallies fear and discontent to get votes and capitalised on a self-inflicted wound for the Labour Party. Time will tell of what happens next in this nightmare scenario.
