Gordon Brown campaigning in north London yesterday
Fighting talk from Brown as he rallies the party faithful in Kirkcaldy and Hendon
Martin Fletcher
The words were almost Churchillian. “We will fight for every vote in every seat every hour between now and the close of polls,” Gordon Brown promised the party faithful in his Kirkcaldy & Cowdenbeath constituency on Friday.
“We fight with strength in our soul and confidence in our cause because we are the people’s party — not simply a party in Britain but the party of Britain.”
It gave the impression that the Prime Minister would be barnstorming around the country. Aides reinforced that idea: “We are going to win this campaign people to people, door to door, street to street,” said one. The reality is more prosaic. Mr Brown may be the underdog, but his campaign to date has been distinctly low key. He does not have a campaign bus. He has yet to address a meeting open to the general public.
On Saturday he made several appearances, but all except one were in his own constituency, where he has a rock-solid 18,216 majority and is sure of a warm reception.
His campaign event yesterday was in Hendon, northwest London, where he met precisely six voters, at least three of whom were Labour supporters. Mr Brown arrived just before 3pm, his Jaguar coming face to face with an unsuspecting learner driver as it entered Fortune Avenue.
He joined a young couple named Richard Belle and Cheryl Revill — both Labour supporters — in their flat on the fourth floor of a new block. The four other guests included Ms Revill’s father, a Labour Party member, and were chosen with the help of Andrew Dismore, the local Labour MP. The group of three men and three women included three from ethnic minorities — a model of political correctness.
Mr Brown chatted for 20 minutes about how Labour’s affordable housing policies had helped Mr Belle and Ms Revill to buy their first home. He spoke about schooling, Bollywood and citizenship. He cracked jokes, mentioned his children and poked fun at his inability to use a mouse.
Then he returned to Downing Street to work on today’s manifesto speech and, doubtless, catch up on the fortunes of his beloved Raith Rovers in the Scottish Cup semi-final.
Aides say that these intimate meetings help him to highlight specific Labour policies and “create a buzz” in marginal constituencies.
The big prize, however, is the television news clip of a Prime Minister not known for his common touch, listening to “ordinary people” in their homes. And as long as the audience is sympathetic, Mr Brown is very good at it.
He is not alone in resorting to tightly controlled events. All the party leaders do it. Today’s elections are won on television, the internet and Twitter.
Not all of Fortune Avenue was won over yesterday. Darshna Yagnik, 38, a university lecturer, said: “It’s all to make himself look like a people’s person but he’s not.”
British National Party leader Nick Griffin’s appearance on Question Time wil expose his “unacceptable” views, Gordon Brown said.
The Prime Minister said the decision to invite Mr Griffin, who was elected as an MEP earlier this year, on to the show was a matter for the BBC and he did not want to interfere with it.
But he described the party as “racist and bigoted,” and urged anyone tempted to cast a protest vote against the mainstream parties not to turn to the BNP.
Speaking on Real Radio in Yorkshire before the recording of today’s episode of Question Time, Mr Brown said: “If on Question Time, they are asked about their racist and bigoted views that are damaging to good community relations, it will be a good opportunity to expose what they are about.
“In a recession, people are tempted to vote against their traditional voting patterns like voting Labour, which we regret. But I want to persuade people that voting for the BNP is not the right thing to do.”
Mr Brown also defended the decision to allow Justice Secretary Jack Straw to appear on the show alongside Mr Griffin, in contrast with Labour’s previous refusal to share a platform with the BNP.
He said: “The issue is: should we have someone there? Jack Straw is a very experienced person who has had to deal with the BNP and their awful politics over a period of time.
“At every point, I believe we have got a duty to expose the BNP for what are racist and sectarian politics.”
Last week, the BNP was ordered by the courts to change its membership rules, which only allowed “indigenously Caucasian” people to join, said Mr Brown.
He said: “For a political party to exclude people on the grounds of race is completely unacceptable.
“Their views about mixed marriages and everything else are unacceptable for the modern world.”
In a message to voters considering a protest vote in the forthcoming general election, Mr Brown asked: “Do you really want to vote for, support or give succour to a party that wanted to exclude people from their party on the grounds of race and colour in the way that they did for many years?
“Do you want to support a party that has some of the most bigoted views in our country?”
Gordon Brown got on board with the Mirror’s Hope not Hate bus yesterday, where he met Holocaust survivors and condemned the British National Party.
The Prime Minister warned: “There is no answer to our problems in parties that practise policies of prejudice or racism or anti-semitism.
“The unfortunate thing about the BNP is that this is their essence – policies of persecution and discrimination.”
The bus was at the South Bank in London as it ended a 15-day tour of the country, fighting racism and fascism and rejecting the far-right BNP in Thursday’s European and county elections.
Mr Brown met Holocaust survivors Ben Helfgott and Zigi Skipper, both 79, and Normandy veteran Kenneth Riley, 85, along with Harry Potter actor Jason Isaacs.
Ben, who was 10 when Hitler invaded his native Poland, said: “These people, the BNP, are Holocaust deniers. They don’t give anyone any respect, so they deserve only condemnation.”
Zigi, also Polish, survived the notorious Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp.
He said: “I would like to thank the Hope not Hate campaign for standing up against hatred. I believe the British will not be kidded by the BNP’s lies.”
Normandy hero Ken said. “I fought the Nazis before and I’ll fight them again. Britain’s not the place for fascists.”
Jason, 43, said: “I’m in huge admiration for what these men have lived through. The BNP are the opposite of what being British is all about.”
Turning to Ken, he added: “This man here has the medals and knows the sacrifice made during the Second World War in the name of fighting fascism. All we need to do is to raise our voices.”
Gordon Brown has insisted that all parties to the Middle East dispute over Palestine must be brought together to thrash out a lasting peace settlement despite the recent hostilities in Gaza.
Speaking at a press conference with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in Downing Street on Thursday, the PM said that peace could be achieved in the Middle East based on a secure Israel and a viable Palestinian state. Progress on the issue remains a top priority for the UK and international partners will be urged to work together to come to an agreement, he said.
The leader of Malaysia’s resurgent opposition has declared that he will take power on September 16
Anwar has said he will claim power by September 16. Photograph: Ahmad Yusni/EPA
The Malaysian government has tried its utmost to keep Anwar Ibrahim, the leader of Malaysia’s resurgent opposition, from power ever since he fell out of favour a decade ago.
In the late 1990s, Anwar looked set to take over from Mahathir Mohamad, who guided Malaysia over 22 years to economic success. But mentor and protege had a bitter falling out over Malaysia’s response to the Asian economic crisis in July 1997.
Mahathir favoured currency and foreign investment controls. Anwar, who was then deputy prime minister and finance minister, implemented an austerity programme that slashed government spending and deferred infrastructure projects dear to Mahathir.
The rift became irreparable, when Anwar — named by Newsweek as man of the year in 1998 — went on a campaign against corruption and cronyism that rankled many of the elite, including Mahathir’s son, Mirzan who had myriad business dealings.
In 1998, Anwar was accused of sodomising his wife’s driver, convicted in 2000 and sentenced to nine years in prison amid widespread international protests. Anwar remains grateful to the British prime minister, Gordon Brown, among others who pleaded his cause and in 2004 Malaysia’s supreme court overturned the verdict, although corruption charges against him stood. He was released later that year but was barred from standing for office until April this year.
Following his release, Anwar held teaching posts at Oxford University and Georgetown University in Washington and pursued his campaign against corruption through his post as honorary president of AccountAbility, a London thinktank advocating better corporate governance.
In his capacity as a campaigner against corruption, Anwar strongly criticised Britain’s decision to halt a major corruption investigation into BAE, Britain’s biggest arms company, in its dealings with Saudi Arabia. What signal did that send leaders in developing countries, he argued, as he submitted a letter to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development that was scathing of the government’s decision.
Even as he spoke out against international corruption, Anwar was plotting a political comeback. In an interview early last year he said was getting round his ban on speaking at public forms by addressing the public at funerals and feasts. He made it clear that he was ready to challenge the Malaysian political elite that sacked and imprisoned him.
“I am committed to a reform agenda, I believe in a democratic process and a more accountable government,” he said then. “I can’t reasonably expect this to happen without political involvement. If I chose to submit, then I would give credence to the government and support their repressive measures.”
It was not just brave talk. First he helped the disparate opposition parties make huge inroads in parliamentary elections in March. The Barisan Nasional, a coalition of three racially based parties led by the United Malays National Organisation (Umno) that has dominated Malaysian politics since independence from Britain in 1957, saw its two-thirds majority evaporate. By contrast, the opposition parties saw their seats in the 222-member parliament jump to 82 from 19.
Anwar’s march back to power seemed unstoppable when he easily won a seat that he had previously held for 17 years. Out of the blue came new sodomy charges, when a 23-year-old aide, Saiful Bukhari Azlan, accused Anwar of sodomising him, a charge that a prison sentence of 20 years in Malaysia, even between consenting adults.
Despite the accusations, which he maintains are a transparent attempt to stop his political comeback, Anwar has raised the stakes by declaring that he will take power on September 16, Malaysian national day, by persuading enough government MPs to defect to the opposition. The government was rattled enough to send 50 MPs on a trip to Taiwan due to last more than a week to forestall such a move.
As the government goes into political contortions to keep Anwar at bay, the opposition leader says he can get the 30 MPs he needs to bring down the government. If — and it remains a big if as the ruling party will do all it can to cling on to power — Anwar finally gets to lead Malaysia, what will this multi-racial country look like?
Raja Petra Kamarudin, fellow at the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, wrote on Malaysia Today, a website the Malaysian government is trying unsuccessfully to block: “Anwar has to balance the aims of the parties in his coalition, and we will see compromises being made. That is the reality in Malaysia. But I think a culture of dialogue will be developed under his watch and that will be a great achievement indeed. I think at least that can be accomplished by him.”
Like Turkey, another Muslim country with its interplay of democracy and Islam, Malaysia will be closely watched to see how it copes with forces for change. Anwar firmly rejects the notion that Malaysia’s “democratic deficit” has anything to with the fact that it is Muslim.
“The newly independent Muslim states were democracies,” Anwar said. “Indonesia had a free election in 1955 until it was hijacked by Sukarno. Iran had democratic elections only to be hijacked by the CIA, British intelligence and the oil companies. Seventy five to 80% of Muslims are familiar with the democratic process.”
