Election Court To Hear New Claim Of Dirty Tricks

According to The Birmingham Post, a special election court is to convene in Birmingham for the second time in two years, to consider allegations of 'dirty tricks' at a city council poll. A High Court judge will sit in October to consider claims that Liberal Democrat candidate Saeed Aehmed was beaten by Labour's Muhammed Afzal in Aston as the result of a smear campaign - allegations which, if proven, could see the Aston election result over-ruled and a by-election held or Councillor Afzal sacked and replaced by Mr Aehmed.

The hearing follows an election petition submitted by the Lib Dems in May alleging that Labour activists wrongly claimed Mr Aehmed was arrested by the police following an investigation into suspected post ballot fraud. Coun Afzal, who beat Mr Aehmed by 679 votes to win the election, is accused in the petition of issuing false statements and of committing illegal practices. In fact, according to the newspaper article, Mr Aehmed was not arrested or even spoken to by the police.

Muhammed Afzal had previously been accused of being one of the ringleaders of a "widespread vote-rigging fraud" in the Aston Ward in 2004, involving the collection of postal voting forms "by forgery and deception" and their completion in a local "vote-rigging factory". But the Court of Appeal quashed the findings of Election Commissioner Richard Mawrey QC the following year.

A smear campaign was employed in Hackney in 2006 when one of the candidates for Borough Mayor was falsely accused of having been previously declared bankrupt. Such smear campaigns, very much the norm in the US, are a growing activity here in the UK.