Downing Street outs Brexit whistleblower in official statement

Shahmir Sanni, a whistleblower who alleged illegal spending in the Vote Leave campaign, has been outed by one of Theresa May’s closest advisors in an official statement from Downing Street on Friday. Sanni had alleged that a large donation to Vote Leave had been made through the organisation BeLeave, a group with ties to Cambridge Analytica. It is believed Vote Leave used this group to bypass election spending laws.

The allegations prompted Downing Street to release an official statement from Stephen Parkinson, May’s political secretary. In the statement, Parkinson said he had dated Sanni for 18 months during the Brexit campaign, which was partly why he had access to this information.

“I had to come out to my mum the day before yesterday,” Sanni said at London’s Frontline Club. “You know what, he knew, he knew that I wasn’t out to my mum.

“Number 10, Dominic Cummings, and Stephen Parkinson have stripped me of the most important conversation for me, to have with my mother and my sisters and my family.

“I came out to my mum and she said to me, I love you no matter what and they’re doing it to shut you up. I was like thanks momma.”

The public outing has put Sanni’s family in Pakistan, a heavily conservative Muslim country, in danger.

Downing Street maintains that the statement released by Parkinson was a “personal statement”, despite it being emailed out as “official” to The New York Times.

Labour MP Ben Bradshaw criticised the statement in the House of Commons: “How is it remotely acceptable that when a young whistleblower exposes compelling evidence of law-breaking by the Leave campaign, implicating staff at No 10, one of those named instead of addressing the allegations issues an officially sanctioned statement outing the whistleblower as gay and thereby putting his family in Pakistan in danger?”

May responded: “I, of course,e recognise the importance of ensuring that we do recognise that for some being outed as gay is difficult because of their family circumstances. What I want to see is a world where everybody is able to be confident in their sexuality and doesn’t have to worry about such things.”

When asked if May would fire her political secretary she said she wouldn’t because he “does a very good job.”

Tim Gibson - mygwork

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