We said that we would wait until after the election, but the public demand for the memes has been significant, so, we have changed our minds. Below we show some of the memes adopted by the campaign to support Sophia Naqvi.

We concluded the report on the connections between Labour and quasi-independent candidate Anas Khan, with the remark, “It seems that every party represented in the byelection is required to hold some sort of event for Gaza. “

In a letter to residents, Labour candidate felt the need to open his appeal with his involvement in organising “Eid Prayer in the Park” over the last four years and let it be known that the proceeds were donated to local mosques.

Newham Independents have suggested that all is not true in this letter (see below) and,

News leaking out of the campaign suggests that the battle for Plaistow North will not be won on the doorstep, but in the mosques.

Various community leaders are making comments along the lines of “it's time for a change”, and repeating the line from Naqvi’s election material, “Labour isn’t working”.

The Mirza/Naqvi team put out the following. Oh, the irony!

The Mirza camp has been generating some amusing memes during the by-election campaign. We made a decision to compile and publish them all, but only after the campaign.

We learn that the mayor and some 30 Newham councillors have signed a letter to the Leader of the Labour Party, Keir Starmer. The inclusion of some names suggests a desire of some parliamentary hopefuls to burnish their credentials in advance of the West Ham and Beckton selection.

When Open Newham charted the influence of Tablighi Jamaat in the selection of Rokhsana Fiaz as the Labour candidate for mayor, we noted that one of the key organisers of the youth faction within the Tablighis, (Anas Khan) was also the key individual within Newham People’s Alliance.

The race begins in earnest and the candidates are announced.

Amid allegations that four shadow cabinet members are threatening to resign, eight (or maybe nine), Newham councillors joined some 150 Muslim councillors from across the UK with a view to getting Keir Starmer to call for a ceasefire in Gaza. (For some reason Salim Patel is recorded twice, but this may be a mistake and the second should have been Miraj Patel).

The battle lines for Newham Independents have been drawn.

In a two-pronged assault, Mirza’s Independents assert that Labour is failing the people of the borough locally and that Labour nationally is supporting Israel over Palestine.

Labour has launched, or rather dipped its toe into the by-election, by asking residents of Plaistow North, what they want them to do.

Arguably, the election of Mehmood Mirza has been one of the most interesting things to happen on Newham Council for some time. We have known Mr Mirza for some years and have rarely agreed with him on anything political. However, such is the nature of life and politics, that those things we see as bad, others see as virtues.

We suggested that Wall End was a shoe-in for Labour, but that they might face some competition in Boleyn.

Labour now knows what opposition it faces in the two byelections, (full details below).

Boleyn clearly looks to be the more interesting race. Alongside Labour, the Conservatives, Lib-Dems and Greens are putting up candidates.

Readers will be familiar with Mehmood Mirza. This former member of the Labour Party, and former constituency officer and former supporter of Mayor Fiaz, has been conducting a virtually single-handed campaign to clean up the borough.

A variety of political parties will be vying for the two seats, up for grabs in the forthcoming by elections. We thought that we’d like to take a look at how the various political parties advertise themselves.

For the first time since the introduction of the mayoralty, the mayor has polled a smaller percentage of the vote than have the Labour council candidates.

Additionally, Newham had the second lowest turnout of any borough in London, which suggests a degree of disillusionment on the part of the voters.

The Big Story is clearly, that on a vote that saw the Labour Party increase its numbers across the country, in East London, their vote went down.

Across London, Labour took Wandsworth, Westminster and Barnet. It was a night to excite the faintest of Labour hearts, although it is possible that registering their disgust at the behaviour of those at the top of the party, Conservative voters simply stayed at home.

Between writing the article on Cllr Belgica Guana, and her unfortunate sympathies for right-wing conspiracy theories and publishing it, the Labour Party has indeed got its act together and suspended her.