by Brian Bamford & Les May
with help from Carl Faulkner
Last year Allen Brett Rochdale's council leader said Cllr. Rana had ‘stepped away’ from his cabinet responsibilities.
ON the 16th, August 2018 businessman and big time Rochdale landlord, Cllr. Rana, was said to have 'stepped away' from his responsibilities as assistant to the finance portfolio holder Labour leader Allen Brett. It must be a cosy relationship. In August last year Cllr. Rana was outed as a vote swindler by Carl Faulkner for falsely claiming two postal votes, Council leader Brett was quick to defend Cllr. Rana.After expressing initial regret Brett said: 'Naturally I am disappointed in Cllr. Rana's error [but] he is a very talented individual who shares our collective passion to improve our borough.’
Now the landlord Rana, who duped the electorate in 2018, is now comfortably back in the saddle next to the boss-man Brett.
Who says crime doesn't pay?
Cllr. Rana must be very talented to purloin two postal votes for himself out of the British electoral system and to now land a top job helping the Council leader Cllr. Brett to run the town's financial affairs. There are not many of us that could do that and get away with it.
Farooq Ahmed, who was in charge of finance in 2014, was not so lucky as Cllr. Rana; when a fellow Labour Councillorr Neil Emmott claimed he had been the victim of a homophobic remark from Cllr. Ahmed. Cllr. Ahmed was alleged to have warned him to 'mind his back' in an altercation on Cheetham Street in Rochdale. Cllr. Emmott was at the time working for the now disgraced Rochdale MP, Simon Danczuk, who ultimately left the Labour Party under a cloud. Cllr, Ahmed ended up leaving the Labour Party after he was convicted of a public order offence.
It's a strange world in which someone guilty of a public order offence loses his position as head of Finance, while a self-confessed election fraudster keeps his job. Perhaps poor Cllr. Ahmed, who is of Bangldeshi origin didn't put his nose in the right place, or maybe he simply didn't own enough real estate in Rochdale.
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1 comment:
Carl makes a valid point as Zulfiqar pointed out at our Open Meeting that people from S. E. Asia can be very 'tribal'. Probably a very pertinent question to ask if Clr. Rana is of Pakistani heritage and ex-Clr. Farook Ahmed is of Bangladeshi heritage. As Zulfiqar is of Kasmiri heritage he might be able to give a balanced view on the differing reactions by the Labour group to the two men. Incidentally on the two occasions I saw Farooq and talking to people outside Labour I found him likeable probably sincere in his views as did others.
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