As Guido says, Welcome to the People’s Islamic Republic of Tower Hamlets:

Lutfur Rahman

"Backed by extremists, the independent Rahman Lufter has won his smear campaign against the Labour Party and taken control of almost a billion pound budget as the Mayor of Tower Hamlets. Andrew Gilligan has become somewhat expert on the race and reports of Luftur’s supporters scolding women on the way to the polls for their immodest dress and lists the wake of destruction his campaign has left. But who was it that helped this dubious race? Well the candidate had the backing of Respect and extreme Islamic groups, but it seems that there was one endorsement he was particularly proud of if his leaflets are anything to go by:"

"Red Ken" Livingstone's support for Rahman.

I don't think anyone's surprised on Red Ken's support, after his friendship with Al-Qaradawi.

Background:
UK: Islamist organization receives funds secretly.
UK: Charity praised by PM and Prince Charles, linked to Hamas.

Lutfur Rahman

Lutfur Rahman was sacked by the Labour Party last month as its candidate for mayor of Tower Hamlets amid deep concerns about his links with a Muslim supremacist group, the Islamic Forum of Europe (IFE), and a number of powerful local businessmen. 

Mr Rahman also signed up entire families of "sham" paper Labour members – some of whom do not even support the party – to win nomination as Labour's candidate. 

Mr Rahman is now running as an independent and his supporters say he is "hopeful" of victory. 

Helal Abbas

"Things look very good," said one of his major business backers, Shiraj Haque, a millionaire restaurateur. 

Labour sources said the contest between Mr Rahman and their new candidate, Helal Abbas, was "extremely close" and would depend on turnout in Thursday's election. 

Unlike a conventional leader, a directly-elected mayor has almost complete power over a council's finances and cannot be controlled, checked or sacked by councillors. 

Tower Hamlets moved from a conventional leader system to a mayoralty this year as a result of a campaign spearheaded by the IFE. 

In secret filming earlier this year, Abu Talha, an IFE activist, told an undercover reporter for The Sunday Telegraph and Channel 4's Dispatches: "The mayor is going to have a lot more control. That's why we need to get someone, one of our brothers, in there. Which we will do."

Source.

Some people that support Lutfur Rahman are racists and anti-Semites (what a surprise!).

Background:
UK: Islamist organization receives funds secretly.
UK: Charity praised by PM and Prince Charles, linked to Hamas.

Fundamentalist organization "Islamic Forum of Europe" has close links to Muslim Aid, a charity foundation which was giving money to Palestinian Islamic Jihad. It seems it continues its infiltration on Twoer Hamlets

As readers of the paper, this blog and viewers of Channel 4’s Dispatches will know, very disturbing things are going on at Tower Hamlets, the east London council which has fallen under the influence of an Islamic supremacist group, the Islamic Forum of Europe, based at the hardline East London Mosque.

The Labour council leader, Lutfur Rahman, squirmingly refuses to deny that he was elected to his job with the IFE’s help. Several key officials and councillors are closely linked to the IFE. Various organisations controlled by the IFE, including a youth group called the Osmani Trust, have been given enormous amounts of council money.

The Osmani Trust, run by leading figures in the IFE, is a recent merger of two IFE youth organisations, Blyda and Elite Youth. Part of its purpose, according to critics, is to take vulnerable young people off the streets and imbue them with the values of the IFE.

The man in charge of its project working with local gang members, Muhammad Rabbani, is the same person who trains young IFE recruits. Last year, he told them: “Our goal is to create the True Believer, to then mobilise these believers into an organised force for change who will carry out dawah [preaching], hisbah [enforcement of Islamic law, eg Sharia law] and jihad. This will lead to social change and iqamatud-Deen [an Islamic social, economic and political order.]… We have to bear in mind that victory is for Islam and Muslims.”

Despite the exposure of all this, the council’s cabinet brazenly decided on April 7 to hand another £500,000 to the Osmani Trust. Perhaps aware of what it might do to the Labour vote at next month’s election, the decision was taken in secret – only to be notified to the public once Labour was safely back in power. But I’ve been leaked the papers. Sorry, chaps!

In September 2008, Tower Hamlets decided to spend £3.3 million on building the Osmani Trust a new youth centre, even though there is already an existing, secular youth centre just round the corner, recently refurbished by the council at massive public expense. This sum then mysteriously rose to £4 million. It then mysteriously rose again, in June 2009, to £4.4 million.

This month, the Osmani Trust was secretly granted yet another half-million, taking the total council contribution to this project to £4.9 million – nearly 50% higher than the original amount. It will be given in the form of four and a half years’ free rent on the premises the council has just built them and is supposedly because the Osmani Trust has agreed to raise a similar amount from its other income for fixtures and fittings of the new building.

In fact, of course, quite a lot of the Osmani Trust’s “other income” also comes from… Tower Hamlets council. Last year Blyda and Elite Youth together scored a handy £400,000 worth of grants from the council, excluding money for the new building. They got a further £365,000 from other public sector bodies, including the NHS and the Big Lottery Fund. Nearly 70 per cent of their funding comes from the public purse.

As well as being done in secret, the decision to give the extra half-mill was taken under an unusual “urgency procedure”. So the alternative explanation for the council’s action, of course, is that they are anticipating defeat – and need to shovel as much public money as they can into the Islamists’ coffers before that happens.

Whatever the reason, the continued willingness of Tower Hamlets council to act as a paymaster for Islamists needs to be exposed to the public while they still have a chance, at the polls, to stop it.

Source.

Background on Tower Hastings here and here.