A convicted election fraudster has been spotted campaigning again for the Labour Party.
In an exclusive from VoteWatch, Tariq Mahmood, who has been convicted in the past of rigging votes and who helped multiple election candidates in Peterborough, was seen posing for a picture while campaigning for Labour ahead of the local elections.
Mr Mahmood was part of a trio who had committed systematic electoral fraud in Peterborough. This resulted in Mr Mahmood receiving a 15-month prison sentence. Also convicted as part of the scheme were a Labour Party Chancellor and Mohammed Choudhary, Peterborough’s former Labour Mayor.
The electoral fraud scheme involved fabricating votes by having ballot paper sent to his address rather than constituents, who had been expecting their postal and proxy votes.
Following the by-election in 2019, the then-Brexit Party Leader Nigel Farage called Peterborough a “rotten borough” and said “the evidence of voter fraud with postal votes is there for all to see”. The Labour Party’s Lisa Forbes won the election by under 700 votes, and it was suspected Mr Mahmood had been helping the campaign, although Ms Forbes denied this claim.
This was revealed by Cambridgeshire Police, who were following up on five reports of electoral malpractice.
Mr Farage said at the time: “It’s just endless, isn’t it? There’s more and more and more of it.
“I think there is something inherently wrong with the entire postal voting process in this country.
“I think it’s open to corruption, bribery intimidation, abuse. We’ve seen so many cases now where again and again we find – particularly in the inner cities – postal voting is producing the wrong results.
“And I’m afraid Peterborough looks like another one of those rotten boroughs.”
The local elections are due to take place next month on 6th May.
