After the recent local elections, John McDonnell put Labour’s ‘better-than-expected’ results in part down to the efforts of Momentum activists. Alas, it seems that not everyone involved with the hard-left campaign group is so in chime with the party when it comes to Labour values.
Mr S understands that Momentum’s Marlene Ellis has been suspended by the party over an open letter to Corbyn from the Momentum Black ConneXions group. Ellis — who previously made the news after she was accused of labelling Chuka Umunna as not ‘politically black‘ — co-signed the blog post which calls on Corbyn to reverse the ‘unjustified suspension of Ken Livingstone’ after the former mayor was suspended over his Hitler comments. In the post — which Ellis has co-signed — MBC accused Corbyn of playing ‘right into the hands of Zionist criminals’:
‘The totally unjustifiable knee-jerk reaction to pro-Zionist and other Right wing pressures from within and outside the current Labour Party Leadership by the suspension of Ken Livingstone over his quite interesting remarks on Anti-Semitism and Anti-Racism has sent shock waves into the very heart of our Black Communities in Britain and all over the World!
We of Momentum Black ConneXions (MBC) never imagined a Labour Party led by you, Jeremy Corbyn, would ever immediately react in such frightful haste by clamping down on the freedom of critical radical expression.’
The letter goes on to call for the suspension of Labour’s John Mann rather than Ken after the pair clashed over his comments.
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