Sharon Osbourne has seemingly confirmed plans to attend an anti-immigration march organised by far-right commentator Tommy Robinson.
Robinson, whose real name is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, held a similar anti-immigration rally at Trafalgar Square, called ‘Unite the Kingdom’, which drew over 100,000 participants in September. A new march under that same banner will take place on May 16.
“We have had enough of migration, enough of mass immigration, we’ve had enough of oppression from a tyrannical government,” claimed Robinson in a video uploaded to Instagram under the account GauciReports.
He said he wanted to “bring London to a standstill” adding, “They have tried to silence us for decades, but we will be silenced no more”.
“We don’t want another three years of borders open,” he claimed and later echoed a statistic quoted by Nigel Farage that people from Afghanistan are 22 times more likely than Britons to have committed a sexual offence, which has since been debunked.
Osbourne, the widow and former manager of the late Ozzy Osbourne who has lived in the US for decades before returning to the UK last year, commented on the post: “See you at the march.”
At least 25 people were arrested at the previous ‘Unite the Kingdom’ march, and 26 police officers were injured at the event.
Other far-right figures, such as Katie Hopkins and Laurence Fox, were also in attendance. Elon Musk gave a speech via video link, criticising what he called the “woke mind virus” and telling the crowd that “violence is coming” and “you either fight back or you die”.
Tim Booth, of rock band James, later hit out at Robinson and attendees of the rally, for their “cynical” use of the band’s track ‘Sit Down’.
Robinson used the song in a video posted to X, which showed the size of the crowd at the rally. Booth said he was “disgusted” by the use of the song, without the band’s permission, and called the track “the antithesis” of the far-right activist’s movement.
An estimated 5000 anti-fascist counter-protesters faced the far-right activist-led “unite the kingdom” rally. Many of these counter-protesters were trapped and surrounded by those attending the “unite the kingdom” march, who did not let them leave for over three hours, according to The Guardian.
By contrast, a major anti-far right march last month organised by the Together Alliance and reportedly brought half a million people took to the streets of central London to stand up for unity and to build public awareness about the growing threat of the far right in the UK and beyond.
Fontaines D.C., Paloma Faith and Lenny Henry were among the names signing up to the campaign in December and the likes of Jessie Ware, Billy Bragg and Katy B performed at the event.
Afterwards, Bragg said he felt “greatly inspired” by the protest, adding: “The concerns that people have about rising cost of living, widening gaps between the rich and poor, an over-stretched NHS, the lack of affordable housing and the effects of the climate crisis cannot be solved by rounding up people of colour and forcing them to ‘remigrate’.”
Addressing the target of the demonstration, he continued: “Between now and the next election, there will be politicians of the Far-age right and the far right who will bang the drum for remigration in the hope that no one will ask them how they intend to address those aforementioned problems. Yesterday suggests that the people of Britain will not allow themselves to be fooled by such shysters.”
In other news, earlier this year, Osbourne claimed she was “seriously thinking” about running to become the Mayor of Birmingham on the red carpet at the Grammy Awards. Birmingham was the hometown of her late husband Ozzy, and the location for his ‘Back To The Beginning’ farewell gig.
Osbourne previous dropped hints about wanting to turn her sights to politics before then too. As reported by GB News ahead of the Grammys, Osbourne said that she was thinking of getting involved in politics in the UK city after learning that someone with a terrorism conviction was allegedly seeking a seat on Birmingham’s City Council.
“This has nothing to do with racism. I think I’m gonna move to Birmingham and put my name down for the ballot to be on the council. I’m serious,” she said.
The person seeking the seat was Shahid Butt, who was reportedly given a five-year prison sentence in 1999. GB News writes that he has previously claimed that the charge against him was “fabricated” and that he was “falsely convicted”. He maintains his innocence against the allegations and convictions raised against him.
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