Neil Wilby Media

Following an exclusive published by Neil Wilby Media yesterday (24th March, 2024), which revealed the local elections plans of a fledgling political party in a famous old East Lancashire mill town, a further candidate has been announced.

As can be seen in the above image, The Oldham Group (TOG), which has applied to the Electoral Commission to be formally registered as a political party, is fielding Mohammed Ali in the controversial Chadderton South ward.

Taking the number of new TOG candidates to five, plus Cllr Muhammad Irfan, who is defending his Hollinwood seat on Oldham Metropolitan Borough Council at the polls on Thursday 2nd May, 2024. 

In 2022, Chadderton South saw Labour not only lose a previously safe seat, it saw the downfall, in very controversial circumstances, of their Council Leader, Cllr Arooj Shah (read more here). It was the second time in six years that she had lost her seat as a sitting councillor, having been ousted in 2016 from her home ward of St Mary’s. 

Labour regained the seat last year, in the form of Cllr Holly Harrison, again in unusual circumstances, after the incumbent councillor did not stand for re-election over a serious criminal allegation for which he remained on police bail at the time – and had previously led to him being suspended from his own Party. The subject councillor robustly denied the allegation against him.

TOG’s Mohammed Ali should not be confused with Mohammed Imran Ali (who prefers to be known as ‘Irish Imy’), who is Cllr Shah’s Special Political Adviser (SPAD) and, for the past several years, a tireless Labour activist and prominent charity and humanitarian aid champion. Imran Ali played a leading role in Cllr Shah’s return to the Council, and the Leader role, last year when she regained a St Mary’s seat.

Chadderton South, is one of the Labour wards that The Oldham Group, and its straight-talking Leader, Cllr Kamran Ghafoor, regard as ‘winnable’, absent of the previous years’ controversies and with a bold, populist manifesto that is likely to appeal to the Borough’s voters growing and increasingly visible disaffection with a Labour administration that has been in-situ since 2011.

Page last updated: Monday 25h March, 2024 at 0745 hours

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