The Good, the Bad and the … (we won’t go there)

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 will briefly canvas Mirza’s positive and not so positive contributions to local politics.

Positive 1

He has shown himself to be independently minded and willing to make a cause his own and to fight for it. In an age when it seems more common to parrot the politically correct mantra, it is heartening to see an individual who actually makes up his mind on an issue and campaigns for it. He has shown that he is willing to work to effect change.

Positive 2

He has relentlessly highlighted the deteriorating state of the borough. More than any other individual he has focussed attention on the state of the roads, the litter and the dumped furniture that blights our streets.

Positive(ish) 3

This is an ‘ish’ because there is an element of populism and opportunism (we suspect) in his championing of various local causes. Nonetheless, he is the only voice on the council that we are aware of, to address the Newham practice of issuing a parking ticket and immediately lifting parked cars; he has also been critical of the use of Browning Road as a means to milk motorists of even more money. He has also been active on the matter of the City Farm. We hope that he will seek to hold the mayor to account in his new role and perhaps focus attention on the “abuse of process” that Newham engaged in in respect of the former farm staff.

Negative 1

Mirza is a dyed-in-the wool Corbynista. It’s not that he thinks differently, but that the solutions to problems from that wing of the party almost always turn out to be wishful thinking. They can be good at criticising, but not so good at generating solutions.

Negative 2

Let’s see what a local blogger says about this one.

As a landlord, (apparently he owns 10 properties),Mirza will join a number of Labour councillors who make up Landlords for Labour. (And here.)

Let us say, there is indeed a sense of irony in championing equity, when you are rich and the owner of multiple properties. Once upon a time, this would have been anathema to anyone seeking political influence on the left. No longer it seems. But as we note, he is not alone in this.

Negative 3

This is probably our biggest issue with Mr Mirza. He was expelled (or left voluntarily before being expelled) for antisemitism. Again, he was far from being alone in the Labour Party on this issue. And Newham has had its fair share of antisemitic councillors, see here, and here and here and there is more, but you get the idea.

For reasons best known to himself, he chose to portray himself holding a Palestinian flag and as a champion of Palestinian rights on his leaflet. This is an interesting approach for someone to take when campaigning for a local council seat in London.

The choice of wording is interesting. He claims to be campaigning for human rights, “in Palestine”. This would rather suggest that he is a critic of Hamas and the PLA, neither of which are known for affection for universal human rights and both have a history of getting rid of Palestinians they don’t like, generally from the other party. However, nobody reading the statement will understand it to mean holding the PLA and Hamas to account. 

When he is referring to Palestine, he means the West Bank and Gaza and Israel. When he says “Free Palestine” we suspect that he means, and that his words will be interpreted as, “Get rid of Israel”. Or more plainly, “Get rid of the Jews”.

In technical political terms, it is a dog whistle. But again, he is not the only one.

He also carries some baggage from his time in the Labour Party, not least of which is his association with people who have had an unfortunate connection to antisemitism.

Mr Mirza has agreed to an interview, later in the year. We will put this to him and he can defend his position or correct us if we are wrong.