LONDON: The chairman of Britain’s hard-right Reform UK party quit on Thursday, saying that trying to get the upstarts elected to government was no longer “a good use of my time”.

Zia Yusuf’s announcement came after he criticised the party’s newest MP for asking Prime Minister Keir Starmer whether he would ban the wearing of burqas in the UK. The resignation hints at unrest in arch-Eurosceptic Nigel Farage’s party, which has already lost one MP since it secured a breakthrough result at last July’s general election.

“Eleven months ago I became chairman of Reform. I’ve worked full time as a volunteer to take the party from 14 to 30 percent (voter support), quadrupled its membership and delivered historic electoral results,” Yusuf wrote on X.

“I no longer believe working to get a Reform government elected is a good use of my time, and hereby resign the office,” he added.

Earlier, the 38-year-old had slammed Sarah Pochin, who was elected in a by-election last month, for her question to Starmer on Wednesday. “I do think it’s dumb for a party to ask the PM if they would do something the party itself wouldn’t do,” Yusuf wrote on X.

He became chairman in July last year, shortly after Reform won 14 percent of the vote and five seats in parliament — an unprecedented haul for a hard-right group in a British general election.

Yusuf was tasked with professionalising the group’s grassroots operations and training up candidates ahead of what Farage has said will be a major challenge to Starmer’s Labour party at the next general election, likely in 2029.

Anti-immigrant Reform has consistently led national opinion polls for several weeks now and won hundreds of councillors at local polls on May 1.

Farage said he was “genuinely sorry” that Yusuf had decided to stand down, but some analysts saw it as another example of the charismatic Brexit cheerleader falling out with a senior figure in his party.

“It’s like deja vu all over again,” political scientist Tim Bale wrote on X, citing Farage’s previous leadership of UKIP and the Brexit Party.

“No-one but no-one gets to be bigger than big Nige,” added the Queen Mary University of London politics professor.

Last month, former Reform lawmaker Rupert Lowe called Farage a “viper” after his dramatic suspension from the party over claims he had threatened Yusuf. Prosecutors did not charge Lowe, citing “insufficient evidence”.

Published in Dawn, June 6th, 2025