The Tories have accepted money from those with links to the Putin regime and to the former Egyptian dictator Hosni Mubarak.
While the Tory press have been up in arms over who the Labour Party accepts donations from, whipping up a moral panic over anything and everything, their outrage machine goes silent when it comes to the Tory party accepting money from those with links to dictators.
While the Sun and Daily Mail have slammed Labour leader Keir Starmer for accepting money from Dale Vince, a key funder of Just Stop Oil, they seemed not to be very concerned about the Tories accepting money from those with links to the Putin regime or to the former Egyptian dictator Hosni Mubarak.
The Labour Party has come under pressure from the Tory press to distance itself from Vince who has given it £1.5 million. This despite the fact that Starmer has condemned the actions of Just Stop Oil and made clear that his donations have no impact on Labour Party policy.
Referring to Vince, the Labour leader previously said on LBC: “Look, he donated to the Labour Party.
“He knows me very well. He knows that nothing that he donates to the Labour Party is going to affect my judgment on this.
“Obviously it’s up to him what he does with his money. But the fact he donates will not, Kam, make a blind bit of difference to the tough line I take in relation to Just Stop Oil.”
Meanwhile, the Tory press have expressed little outrage over the Conservative Party accepting money from a former minister who served in the government of Egyptian dictator Hosni Mubarak.
Last week it was reported that Egyptian-born billionaire Mohamed Mansour has donated £5million to the Conservative Party to help them fight the next election.
Mohamed Mansour, who served as transport minister under the late Mubarak, said he believed that in Rishi Sunak the country has a ‘very capable Prime Minister’, which is why he made the donation.
After Mansour was made a senior treasurer of the Conservatives in December, Labour said Sunak could not claim to stand up for integrity when there was “a billionaire who was a part of Hosni Mubarak’s autocratic regime being put in charge of drumming up donations”.
The Tories clearly have no issue with appointing someone who served in the regime of a brutal dictator, to a senior post within their party or accepting his money. Amnesty International have reported a ‘litany of abuses’ which were committed during Mubarak’s 30 year rule, including torture, a crackdown on free-speech and any political opposition and widespread human rights abuses. The Tory press of course made very little mention of Mansour’s ties to Mubarak and the human rights abuses that occurred under his rule.
The Conservative Party has also accepted donations from Lubov Chernukhin, wife of a former Putin Minister, who has donated more than £2 million to the Conservatives from 2012 to 2020.
Chernukhin, is also on a ‘secret advisory board’ with direct access to Boris Johnson. Her husband Vladimir, served as Mr Putin’s deputy finance minister in the early 2000s.
Ms Chernukhin’s lawyer has previously said: “Mrs Chernukhin’s donations to the Conservative Party have never been tainted by Kremlin or any other influence.”
Basit Mahmood is editor of Left Foot Forward
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