Anti-Fascist Network

Meet at the train station, Rochester, Kent, Sat Nov 1st. 12.30pm

Facebook event

As you may have gathered from the national media, a small political party called the United Kingdom Independence Party got its first MP recently by winning a by-election in Clacton. You may also have gathered that they are hoping to win another by-election on November 20th in Rochester and Strood.

Muddying the waters significantly are the widely-despised ex-BNP mosque-‘invading’ flat-cap wearing racists of Britain First, who are also running their deputy leader Jayda Fransen as a candidate on November 20th.

Britain First have become notorious for wearing uniforms like Poundland Moselyites, running ‘patrols’ of largely Muslim areas and ‘invading’ mosques as well as the shameless hawking of patriotic tat and exploiting the gullible to boost their social media profile through prolific use of ‘click-bait’ images. Their own founder admitted they were “overrun with racists and extremists.”

Britain First have been out ‘campaigning’ fash-style in Rochester – on Saturday they harassed some people in a local mosque and then got their photo taken being pally with the UKIP candidate, which forced UKIP into distancing itself from Britain First.

Britain First and UKIP arm in arm

This however, has not deterred the wannabe paramilitaries in the slightest –  Britain First have explained how they see their strategy: “UKIP at the ballot box, Britain First on the streets”

BF have unofficially ‘guarded’ UKIP meetings several times before. Whether UKIP like it or not, it is clear that some of Britain’s fascists see themselves as UKIP’s ‘muscle’, and they see UKIP as the political expression of what they are doing on the streets.

Now Britain First is planning a ‘Day of Action’ in Rochester this Saturday November 1st and local anti-fascists will be there to oppose it.

Unholy Alliance

It is clear the direction this country is heading as the general election approaches and both Labour and the Tories decide that their best strategy is to steal all UKIP’s language and rhetoric. In the last week we have had a Tory minister talking like it was the 1970s about Britain being ‘swamped’ and ‘under siege’ by immigrants. What next – rivers of blood?

The far-right in all its guises is taking great heart from the rise of UKIP, seeing it as validation of all their ideas. We can be sure that every success for UKIP will mean a further shift of the whole political spectrum to the (far) right and thus more emboldened racists marching in the streets and attacking anyone they don’t like the look of. By the same token, more overt racists in the streets will mean more votes for UKIP.

Kent appears to have the dubious honour of being at the front line of this trend. Local anti-fascists have decided enough is enough.

Some info on Britain First: Another Angry Voice | Hope not Hate