Monbiot to found anti-war coalition

Martin Nicholls and Tom Happold
Monday October 13, 2003

Anti-war activists including the Guardian columnist George Monbiot are planning to form a coalition to challenge the Labour party in next June's European and local elections.
But the attempt to unite socialist parties, anti-globalisation campaigners, peace activists and faith groups; including Muslims, has already aroused the hostility of the Green party, which has branded the project "unhelpful".

The driving force behind the plan is a Muslim mother, Salma Yaqoob, who became active in the anti-war movement after being spat at in the street following September 11.

Now the chairwoman of the Birmingham Anti-War Coalition, she has joined Mr Monbiot in approaching political and peace activists to set a common manifesto.

She told the Guardian: "The strength of the anti-war march was the diversity of the protestors - people came from different backgrounds, different faiths and different political affiliations.

"But without a clear or comprehensive political programme we remain dispossessed, with only the parties of business or bombing to vote for. Together we probably make up the majority."

With the Stop the War Coalition claiming over 500 affiliated groups and more than a million people having marched against the war, Ms Yaqoob and Mr Monbiot believe the enthusiasm generated by the peace movement can be channelled into building a "genuine progressive opposition".

The pair plan a convention later this year to agree a final manifesto

The Greens are not so enthusiastic. Caroline Lucas, one of the party's two MEPs, said: "The Greens have just had our best ever English local election results and a landslide in Scotland.

"Next year, for the first time ever, we're defending seats in the European parliament and the London assembly. It's taken 30 years of hard slog to get into that position. There are no short cuts."

The Greens' leader in the north-west, John Whitelegg, dismissed the coalition's manifesto, which Mr Monbiot is drawing up. "The parts of the manifesto we've seen so far read like summaries of Green party policy," he claimed.

"A rival party with very similar policies could confuse people into splitting the Green vote, which means more of the neo-liberals that George [Monbiot] and Salma [Yaqoob] are strongly opposed to would be elected - or worse, extremists from the BNP could sneak in."

The Greens rejected an electoral pact with the Socialist Alliance at its annual conference in 2001.

The alliance - which scored a mere 1.5% of the vote in last month's Brent East byelection - was established by the Socialist Workers' party (SWP) and other leftwing groups to take electoral advantage of the perceived rightward direction of the Labour party.

So far it has achieved little electoral success and has been increasingly divided over accusations of SWP domination.

The Greens predict a similar fate for this latest venture. "The Socialist Alliance tried to build a broad coalition a few years ago," said London assembly member Jenny Jones.

"It ended up being hijacked by the SWP."

But Ms Yaqoob insisted that the coalition would not be "a force for division". "If there is a good Green candidate running somewhere it would be madness to stand someone against them."

"If the coalition is genuinely broad then no one group can dominate," she added.


 http://politics.guardian.co.uk/green/story/0,9061,1061898,00.html