LIB DEMS DEMAND NEW ELECTION FRAUD ENQUIRY

25-06-2007

Birmingham’s Liberal Democrats are calling for a new investigation into allegations of vote rigging in the 2004 local council elections.

Councillor Martin Mullaney has handed a dossier to West Midlands Police questioning the whereabouts of Labour councillor Mohammed Afzal who was cleared on appeal in 2005 of any wrong-doing.

The results in two of the city’s wards (Aston and Bordesley Green) had previously been overturned by an electoral court, with the judge Richard Mawrey QC condemning the “massive, systematic and organised fraud".

Five Labour councillors involved were barred from standing in future elections, but Afzal was allowed to stand again, and won back his Aston seat this year.

The court heard evidence that he was in a warehouse where forged votes were being counted, but this claim was discounted at the appeal hearing.

Mullaney has undertaken a forensic examination of Afzal’s mobile phone records which he believes cast new light on his whereabouts on the night in question.

Birmingham’s Labour leader Sir Albert Bore reacted angrily to the news, claiming that his party were victims of a “dirty tricks” campaign”.

He said: “The telephone evidence has already been submitted to the court and it was part of the trial.

“The key question is ‘was Afzal in the warehouse at the time’ and all the evidence is that he wasn’t. The only person who said anything to the contrary was a woman police officer, who in view of the evidence seems to have distorted the truth.