Remember Lutfur Rahman? In 2015 the then mayor of Tower Hamlets earned the dubious distinction of being Britain’s first directly elected mayor to be removed after being found guilty of electoral fraud.
Rahman was slapped with a five-year ban on standing for elected office after the Election Court reported him to be ‘personally guilty’ of ‘corrupt or illegal practices or both.’ Judge Richard Mawrey said he’d ‘driven a coach and horses through election law and didn’t care’ while his party Tower Hamlets First, was ‘never really a party but the alter ego of Lutfur Rahman’. An aide was found guilty of corruption; supporters attempted to seek a spiritual influence through local imams while Rahman himself accused rival John Biggs of being a racist.
Now six years on Luthur Rahman is back. Tower Hamlets is due to hold a referendum on 6 May about whether to retain the existing directly elected mayor system or replace it with a traditional council and leader one. Rahman
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