A Muslim entrepreneur of Sri Lankan descent has donated hundreds of thousands of pounds to Reform UK, a right-wing populist political party in the United Kingdom, previously known as the Brexit party.
Zia Yusuf, who co-founded Velocity Black, a luxury concierge app, before selling it for £233 million last year, believes that only Nigel Farage, the party leader has the policies to fix a “broken” country.
The 37-year-old, whose parents came to Britain from Sri Lanka in the 1980s and forged careers in the UK’s National Health Service (NHS), said the “vast majority of Muslims” in the country were patriots and believe that net migration is too high.
He told The Telegraph: “My parents came here legally. When I talk to my friends they are as affronted as anyone by illegal Channel crossings, which are an affront to all hard-working British people but not least the migrants who played by the rules and came legally.
“I think Britain can be an amazing country – it’s the country of Dyson and DeepMind – but we have completely lost control of our borders, that is just factually correct.”
Yusuf claimed net migration was at 50,000 when his parents arrived in Britain, which made assimilation easier, saying: “Last year it was 650,000, and that’s causing the NHS to buckle under pressure, despite us spending more than we have ever spent on it. We are also not building enough homes to cope with the growing population.”
Yusuf’s donation to Reform – the biggest of the election campaign so far – is a major coup for a party that faces regular accusations of racism from critics.
It is also a blow to the Conservatives because the entrepreneur is a former member of the party but now thinks it is unable to make the “hard decisions”. (The Telegraph)
