Dear Readers,

As a previous member of UKIP, I am appalled at the current state and standing of the party.  I joined UKIP because I believed in its message that Britain would thrive outside the European  Union.  I also believed that UKIP would produce policies that would enable Britain to shake off its ‘one-party-state’ image and become a better functioning democratic nation.  My own electoral leanings had, for many years, been Conservative but I had never been remotely tempted before to join any political party.   I have been interested in and followed politics, all my life.

I embraced the party.  I worked for the party as much as I was able, delivering leaflets, attending ‘meet the public’ events in the streets, speaking to people I met on the way and explaining that I believed that UKIP would ‘deliver’ what most of us wanted to see.  A fairer political system and freedom from the clutches of the, largely corrupt, EU.  When asked to cast my vote for such things as NEC members etc., I took the trouble to read everything relevant before voting.

All was well until the Carswell debacle.  Then, a suggestion of divisions within the party began to appear.  The allusion that it was of Nigel versus the NEC; NEC factions dividing behind the scenes and general unrest and discord became the ‘main event’!

I was, and still am, a strong supporter of Nigel Farage.  (I resigned when I felt that he had been forced out!).  For all the accusations hurled at him from within UKIP about his leadership style, I see a man who has caught the imagination of a cross-section of people in Britain.  They, like myself, see a patriotic man who understands their passion to have control of their country returned to them.  A man who understands that most Britains do not wish to be just another ‘region’ in Europe, subject to the decrees and whims of unelected bureaucrats.  A man who understands that Britain has, historically, been a trading nation in its own right and can be so again without having to bow to the decrees about how and when we trade, made by the EU.

Churchill was an inspirational leader.  I doubt whether he was always a joy to work for.  Churchill delivered!

People call into Nigel’s radio programme expressing their support for him and his views.  They beg him to return to frontline politics to break the stranglehold of the one-party-state ‘remainer’ Europhiles who are threatening to deny us the BREXIT for which we voted!

The recent leadership woes (in which more than once I have heard the accusation that Nigel is actively working against the best interests of UKIP) are shameful. Nigel gave 20 years of his life to UKIP.  For many people, he was The Party!  Why would he want UKIP destroyed?  He put up with Establishment smears, harassment and attacks on his “message”. The Establishment clearly feared him. The people listened to him. Some hated him, simply because it was fashionable to equate concern about incontinent immigration with “racism”!

It is time that UKIP came clean.  Stop all the claim and counterclaim! We want to know the real truth about why the ‘Executive’ and the NEC seem to be unable to deliver what the membership wants from the party!  It seems that any suggestion that the grassroots should have any say in adopting policies, or how the Party is run, is cut off at the knees by shadowy figures within the party ‘elite’ who only seem to want to turn it into another bland edition of the liblabcon!

Past and present members should hear the full unexpurgated truth.  Use the database and e-mail to contact members past and present!  Those who feel that the truth should not see the light of day will be equally complicit if the demise of what should be a great ‘People’s Party’ takes place.

UKIP must resolve issues and rebuild the party under a strong and purposeful ‘leader’!  Above all, let us remember that ‘leaders’ must ‘lead’!  (albeit within a democratic framework) and the Executive must keep the best interests of The Party foremost and not be governed by their own agenda.  There must be no cronyism!

Past members will not return and new ones will not join, a party that is divided upon itself.  The party needs both members and funds to survive.  Trust us!  Tell us the truth!  Then turn UKIP back into the ‘People’s Party’.

‘Frederica’