EXCLUSIVE: A £350 a head fund-raising dinner for Nigel Farage’s ‘racist cronies’ at the Grand Sapphire Hotel on an industrial estate off the Purley Way next week has caused outrage.
WALTER CRONXITE, Political Editor, reports
Party people: millionaire Richard Tice has been used to promote the Reform fund-raiser
A massive row has broken out among Croydon’s Muslim community over plans to hold a fund-raising event for Reform UK at the Grand Sapphire Hotel, a venue owned by Pakistan-born millionaire Suleman Raza.
Tickets for the Croydon Reform Christmas Party next Thursday cost up to £350 per head for the privilege of sitting at a “VIP-hosted” table, where the VIPs lined up have been listed variously as Lee “30 pence” Anderson MP, former Tory Assembly Member Keith Prince (Who he?) and Richard Tice, the party’s deputy leader.
The business-cum-political party led by racist grifter Nigel Farage is embroiled in controversy, from having its former leader in Wales jailed for 10 years for accepting money to lobby for Russian interests, to the widespread allegations of Farage’s own anti-semitic conduct when he was a pupil at the posh, fee-paying Dulwich College in the early 1980s.
And then there are the multiple resignations and suspensions of Reform UK councillors (39 at the last count) who were elected barely six months ago.
The Reform event scheduled for December 4 has been advertised online to Reform members in Bromley, where they already have one councillor, Sutton and in Croydon.
Lots of ballroom: the Grand Sapphire Hotel can seat 1,200 for its rubber-chicken dinners
Tickets are only for sale to Reform UK members. The Grand Sapphire ballroom can accommodate up to 1,200 seated guests for banquet-style dinners. Sources suggest there are fewer than 120 Reform members in Croydon.
Inside Croydon is unable to confirm that part of the evening’s entertainment will be a karaoke session at which Tice and Anderson will sing We’re Dreaming of a White Christmas.
And the irony of anti-immigration Reform choosing to hire a venue owned by a Muslim immigrant has not been lost on some.
But many in the Croydon Muslim community are deeply offended that Raza’s business should have ever accepted such a booking. It has been suggested that the hotel’s managers were not made aware that the booking was being made for a Reform event.
Enquiries today to the front desk of the venue, which sits alongside a Purley Way industrial estate, have confirmed that the event is still due to go ahead, despite protests and an appeal from the group Croydon Stand Up to Racism.
Rogues’ gallery: who can resist such a line-up?
Now, some are threatening to boycott Raza’s businesses, which include the Spice Village chain of restaurants.
It has been suggested that the Grand Sapphire would consider cancelling the booking, but only if it received compensation for the lost business. Some estimate such a booking might be worth £20,000.
Staff at the hotel have said that they cannot cancel the booking, for fear that they might be accused of racism.
Happy host: millionaire businessman Suleman Raza was awarded the MBE by Boris Johnson when he was Prime Minister
“Enough is enough!” one member posted to a south London Muslim social media page. “It’s time for us as a community to step up.
“Grand Sapphire Croydon is scheduled for hosting Farage and his band of racist cronies on December 4.
“This needs to be stopped!
“Grand Sapphire, Spice Village and many more enterprises of the owner Suleman Raza need to be boycotted unless he cancels entertaining Nigel Farage and his ilk.”
They added that efforts to “reach out” to the business to get them to cancel the event “have fallen on deaf ears”.
“What’s more upsetting is seeing a Muslin, ethnic migrant business prepared to facilitate the very people who campaign against Muslim, ethnic migrant immigrants.”
Suleman Raza failed to respond to Inside Croydon’s calls today.
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