LONDON (Reuters) -Zia Yousuf, the chairman of Britain’s right-wing Reform UK party, resigned on Thursday.
Reform, led by Brexit campaigner Nigel Farage, won five parliamentary seats in a breakthrough result at last July’s national election, and last month performed strongly in local elections.
The party currently leads national opinion polls, ahead of Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s Labour Party.
“I no longer believe working to get a Reform government elected is a good use of my time, and hereby resign the office,” Yusuf said, without giving further details of the reason for his exit.
Divisions in the party’s upper ranks have been made public before.
In March Reform referred one of its lawmakers, Rupert Lowe, to police over allegations including threats of physical violence against Yusuf.
Prosecutors later said they would not bring charges against Lowe, who was suspended by the party.
Earlier on Thursday, Yusuf said Reform lawmaker Sarah Pochin’s question to Prime Minister Keir Starmer in parliament, asking whether the government would consider banning the burqa, was “dumb”.
Yusuf, who is not a lawmaker himself, became Reform chairman last year.
(Reporting by Sachin Ravikumar; editing by William James)
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