0500 Hrs GMT
London
Satutrday
23 October 2010
Editor © Muhammad Haque
The "Tower Hamlets Borough" "local" "newspaper" the "East London Advertiser" continues to fail to display comments on a misleading and inaccurate report about the "election of a mayor".
BHANGEELAAR! Comment on “East London Advertiser” web site running a misleading “news” item This comment was posted on the web site of the “East London Advertiser2 by the BHANGEELAAR! Campaign against an elected mayor in Tower Hamlets.
The web site would not display it online. This happened for the second time on the same news item on the same web site. We had posted a differently phrased comment in the evening on Friday [22 October 2010], within minutes of the particular “East London Advertiser” item actually coming online. Our initial comment, despite being posted at various times during one hour, was not displayed.
So why have we been trying to post comments on the same “news" story The answer, as always with the movement of which the BHANGEELAAR! Campaign is a part, is the evidence.
For reasons of evidence and accuracy, we have to put on the record what we think of the facts and of the conclusion as being published by the “local” “newspaper” that is so frequently associated with the “London Borough of Tower Hamlets”.
The “East London Advertiser” HAS published a number of our comments in the most recent weeks. But that fact cannot be allowed to be used by it to refuse to publish other comments from us.
Every time there is an inaccuracy or a misleading item, it must be corrected. This is how we can begin to create the information environment conducive to a pro-democratic society.
Whoever is looking for the “local” evidence by looking up the “East London Advertiser” must be given the true facts.
They must be able to assume that what they read on the pages of the "East London Advertiser" whether in archive or contemporaneously is the truth and nothing but the truth. As the "East London Advertiser" themselves are not always following this principle, we have to point out whenever they fail to get the facts right and whenever we notice them being biased against the truth.
The statement of the full facts need not run into hundreds of pages.
But the facts must be truthfully and accurately and objectively put on the record. We publish below our latest comment [at this time: 0600 Hrs local time, 0500 Hrs GMT on Saturday 23 October 2010] and we shall publish our initial one in a few hours. And underneath our latest comment, we also reproduce the full texts of the “East London Advertiser” item on which we are making the comments.
STARTS Comment:
"Your headline and the contents don't match. You quote one of the "candidates", Abbas Uddin "Helal", as saying that the Labour group of councillors would "stand up for ALL the communities of Tower Hamlets, not just one".
This raises the question as to WHICH ONE of the "communities" was that statement referring to and why.
If one community, whichever it is, is being implied then it must be done for the role that its members must have played to the candidate's knowledge. Which in turn exposes as unfounded the claim that there had been apathy. Unless by that in your headline, you were referring to "another community"! If the latter then too your headline is contradicted by the contents of your piece. If one "community" members stayed away and another played the decisive part then the staying away of the one could be and must be linked with the reasons for its “staying away”. And that reason can only be the “staying away” community's advance knowledge of the dominant activity by the one whose members played the decisive part. So what you should be saying based on the evidence that you present is that apartheid has been encouraged in the electorate.
What part has your source, Abbas Uddin "Helal" played in that?
ENDS Comment
BHANGEELAAR! the Campaign against an elected mayor in Tower Hamlets. 0528 Hrs Saturday 23 October 2010
AADHIKARonline quoting The "East London Advertiser" online item timed 17:42 [UK Time and 16:42 GMT] Friday 22 October 2010:
Apathy “won the day” in Tower Hamlets mayoral election
Friday, 22 October, 2010 17:42 PM
MAYORAL RIVALS were all united in their sense of disappointment that few people bothered to turn out in Tower Hamlets first mayoral election which cost the tax payer £180,000.
Conservative candidate Neil King, an Oxford-educated barrister, who was in third place with 5,348 votes congratulated Lutfur Rahman on his victory, though he made a pointed remark about the ‘stunning’ turnout of 25 per and he said his party would continue to act in opposition to the new mayor and the Labour group on the council.
He said: “This process has cost the hard-pressed taxpayers of Tower Hamlets £4.11 a vote of which 1,700 of them are spoiled.
“I hope the People’s Mayor bears in mind that in this borough of [George] Lansbury, [Keir] Hardie and [Clement] Attlee the Conservative party have made them themselves the largest opposition party now.
“I hope he respects the over 5000 people who trooped out from their estates, both new and shiny and old and dilapidated, to put faith in a party that will continue to deliver the opposition on the council.”
He stormed from the stage following his brief speech after the mayoral election result in the early hours of this morning and left York Hall quickly accompanied by a group of Tory supporters.
Green candidate train crew manager Alan Duffell told the Advertiser he had been encouraged by the result for his party which would think about fielding candidates in any forthcoming by-election.
“I’m really pleased with the share that we have got.” He took fifth place with 2,300 votes.
But he added: “The turnout in this election was appallingly low.
“What was demoralising was that we were going to homes and having to spend more time explaining what the process was.”
Liberal Democrat candidate and former Tower Hamlets councillor John Griffiths who polled 2,800 said: “This is one of the most important elections in Tower Hamlet’s history. I voted for the mayoral system to break the mould.
But with this low turnout I think apathy has won the day.”
Labour’s Helal Abbas who polled less than half the votes that his former colleague Lutfur Rahman won said he was disappointed with the result.
He had looked worried as he studied the votes as they were counted, eventually polling 11,254 to Lutfur Rahman’s 23,283 votes.
Councillor Abbas who finished his term as council leader yesterday commented: “This is a sad night for those of us who want to build a better future and a united Tower Hamlets.”
He added: “And as the party with the largest number of councillors at Tower Hamlets Town Hall, Labour accepts our responsibility to work hard to hold the new Mayor to account and to stand up for ALL the communities of Tower Hamlets, not just one.
”We will not let the people of Tower Hamlets down.”
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