The Q&A-style NS Interview in this week’s magazine, which hits the news-stands tomorrow, is with the first directly elected mayor of east London’s Tower Hamlets, Lutfur Rahman. He, of course, is the local politician who came to national prominence when he was removed as Labour’s candidate for mayor by the party’s National Executive Committee, over concerns about his “conduct” and alleged links to Islamic extremists. He then went on to win the mayoral election in October as an independent.
For background on the story, and the various allegations and controversies, check out Rahman’s own website, the Telegraph blog of the Islamist-obsessed Andrew Gilligan and Dave Hill’s London blog on the Guardian website. You can also read an insider’s account of the NEC meeting at which Rahman was deselected here.
The full interview will be published on the NS website but here are some of the key quotes:
– Rahman claims he would not have been removed as Labour’s candidate for mayor had Ed Miliband not been in the middle of his leadership campaign: “I believe it would have been different had he been leader at the time.” But he says he has not had “any conversations with Ed Miliband” about rejoining the Labour Party, nor has he appointed anyone, including Ken Livingstone, “to enter into any such conversations on my behalf”.
– The Tower Hamlets mayor condemns a “small clique in the NEC” for removing him as the Labour candidate and says he is not concerned that two Labour mayors of neighbouring London boroughs, Robin Wales and Jules Pipe, have said they will not work with him: “Tower Hamlets is one of the five Olympics boroughs, but my borough is not run at the behest of any of the leaders of the four other boroughs . . . Whatever other mayors say, that’s their prerogative. I’m not interested in that.”
– Rahman says he believes in a “social-democratic society” and not an Islamic “caliphate”. When I asked him whether he supports secularism and secular politics, he replied: “I absolutely believe in a secular society.” And, on sharia law, Rahman says: “I was invited to the London Muslim Centre [in July 2008] when the then chief justice, Lord Phillips, came to speak and said that there are merits in learning from certain aspects of sharia law, to help our legal system. Not the penal elements; the family and civil elements. If the chief justice can make those comments, who am I to disagree?”
– On his Islamic faith and the allegations of extremism and links to extremist groups, Rahman says he is “a proud Muslim” but denies membership of the controversial Islamic Forum of Europe (IFE), saying: “I don’t believe we have extremist groups in Tower Hamlets. If so, I am sure the government and the police would have intervened long ago.” He says the IFE is “one group among many”, adding: “I believe that previous leaders have worked with the IFE and other such organisations, and some previous leaders are on record as having funded such faith groups. If there was nothing wrong with working with such groups then, why now?”
– I also asked him whether the gay population of Tower Hamlets should be worried by his victory, and he replied: “I made it quite clear that I want to serve each and every member of my community, including the gay and lesbian community. It is not for me to make value judgements. I want to work with every member of the community, whatever their sexual orientation. I grew up with people in the East End from all backgrounds, black, white, gay, and many of them are still my mates.”
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