UKIP ‘investigating’ candidate over alleged homophobic Facebook posts
UKIP is probing allegations that one of its prospective MPs made a series of homophobic and anti-Muslim Facebook posts.
Alan Harris – who is the party’s Prospective Parliamentary Candidate in Oxford West and Abingdon, allegedly made the comments on his Facebook.
Anti-UKIP blog Hope Not Hate posted screenshots in which the candidate appeared to say: “why cant i say in my own bloody country black is still a colour and gay are still queers”
He also allegedly posted about “f**king Muslims” refusing to serve him a bacon sandwich”.
According to the Oxford Mail, Mr Harris’ wife claimed that his account had been “hacked”, but the comments appear to date back as far as 2011, and were posted over a long period of time.
Mr Harris now appears to have deleted both his Facebook page and candidate page entirely.
A spokesman for UKIP said the allegations were being looked into.
However, organiser Dickie Bird of UKIP Oxfordshire – who one of the messages was supposedly sent to – told the Oxford Mail: “Without a shadow of a doubt, I will be looking into this urgently and I would think the party will as well.
“I am a close personal friend of Alan’s and can say this is not language he uses.
“He does not use these kinds of expletives and I have not seen him post those sorts of words on Facebook, so I am shocked that he is being associated with them.”