Nadeine Asbali
Published June 2, 2026 5:02pm
Updated June 2, 2026 5:21pm
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Nigel Farage (left) said that ‘white lives matter’ in response to Henry Nowak’s death (Picture: PA)
The mask isn’t just slipping off, it’s been fully and shamelessly stripped away.
Using the tragic murder of Henry Nowak, Nigel Farage has set off down a very dark road by using the highly charged phrase ‘white lives matter.’
In an emergency statement about the student’s murder at the hands of a Sikh man, and his arrest by police, Farage claimed: ‘We need a change in culture. Enough of anti-white prejudice.’
He also wrote on X, ‘White lives matter too’, parroting the infamous phrase that arose amongst far-right groups in retaliation to the Black Lives Matter movement in 2020.
Of course, it goes without saying that exploiting the pain of a bereaved family in order to score political points is nothing short of unforgivable, not least because it goes against the specific wishes of that family.
Outside court yesterday, Henry’s father Mark said ‘We do not want his death to be used to create further division, hatred or tension. We want his story to help make our streets safer for everyone.’
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Previous Page Next PageFarage clearly didn’t read that statement, and his parroting of this far-right slogan could actively make anyone non-white (or perceived to be) actively unsafe.
That’s dangerous.
And it was no slip of the tongue. Farage’s statement was pre-planned and prerecorded, and his comments were echoed by former Tory Home Secretary Suella Braveman.
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Previous Page Next PageLikewise, prominent Reform supporter Matt Goodwin told the BBC that the situation came about as the result of anti-white racism, before MP Robert Jenrick pressed Shabana Mahmood to use the ‘white lives matter’ phrase.
That’s not just ignorant, but, in my view, inciteful.
It’s easy to dismiss this charade of Farage as another shameless attempt to once again stoke a culture war that turns him into the sort of patriotic hero the country supposedly needs.
Henry’s family called for people not to use his death to fuel division (Picture: PA)
It’s tempting to assume this is nothing more than cheap political point scoring and an attempt to claw back support from the increasingly popular Restore party – rivals of Reform who are outflanking them from the (far) right and have the backing of Elon Musk.
But aside from the brazen use of a young man’s death to grandstand and score political points, this move from Farage marks a dark turn in the already murky trajectory of politics in Britain.
What we are seeing is what those of us with lived experience of this have been saying for some time.
Rupert Lowe of Restore Britain is breathing down Farage’s neck (Picture: Getty)
Our national politics has been constantly descending into more hate-filled, divisive and extreme at an alarming rate.
The sort of views that were once too controversial to share openly are now practically a prerequisite for being a successful politician in this country.
The leader of a party that is ahead in the polls and seems very likely to govern the country in the near future is repeating the sort of extreme nationalist slogans that would once have been confined to the darkest corners of the internet.
The man who could soon be our next prime minister is perpetuating the sort of myths about ‘two-tier’ policing and ‘anti-white’ agendas that I used to see on social media.
What’s more, it feels all the more preposterous and hypocritical for Farage to be jumping upon the horrifying circumstances around this murder when you consider Nowak’s Polish family background.
It wasn’t so long ago – before he turned his attention to small boats and Muslims – that Farage was a leading voice against immigration from countries like that.
Polish people were routinely categorised in this unwelcome invaders stealing British jobs and Farage himself saying he preferred immigrants from India or Australia to those from Eastern Europe.
Nigel Farage is inciting people (Picture: PA Wire)
Now, he’s using the murder of a young man of Polish descent to push another form of hate.
And meanwhile the entire political spectrum is being lurched to the right in a dark attempt by Reform to try and outdo Restore.
But it isn’t their political fortunes that suffer. It’s the lives of people like me.
From flags on roundabouts to huge rallies calling for the mass deportation of Muslims in our capital city, it feels as though the far right are more emboldened than ever before.
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And now on top of all that, these comments from Farage that ‘We should respond to this with pure cold rage,’ because ‘Britain’s historic way of life is being thrown away’ are, in my view, amount to inciting hatred.
While the Clacton MP might not say it aloud, to me ‘pure cold rage’ seems likely to manifest itself in discrimination.
The tragic irony of this entire affair is that a young man’s murder, and a bereaved family’s pain, has been warped into an attempt to sow even more discord in an already fractured country.
For the likes of Nigel Farage, this might be about votes or electoral success, for the rest of us, these comments feel like a massive rubber stamp of approval to the sort of fringe, extreme ideas that dehumanise us and render us unsafe.
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