The end of Hassan Ahmed's time as a Nottingham councillor brings to a close one of the city's most extraordinary political careers. As a pivotal figure under part of Jon Collins' administration, Hassan Ahmed has long been seen as a highly influential figure in city politics.
His career on the authority began when he was elected to represent the St Ann's ward on Nottingham City Council in 1987. Such has been Mr Ahmed's political longevity that the situation on Nottingham City Council when he first entered was one which now seems very distant - it was led by the Conservative Party.
But it is not the longevity of Hassan Ahmed's career that makes it extraordinary. Rather, it is that each of his three terms of service on the city council have preceded allegations of one form or another.
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Two of these abrupt ends came as a result of suspensions from his own Labour Party, both of which resulted in legal action. The first occasion saw Mr Ahmed victorious in the courts, whilst the second is a case which he says he is now fighting.
Yet despite this history, Mr Ahmed claims he could have ended up as the new leader of Nottingham City Council after next month's elections if events had turned out differently. Instead, he isn't even being allowed to stand as a candidate for the party he has been a member of for more than 40 years.
During a recent interview with Nottinghamshire Live, Mr Ahmed said the circumstances of his current suspension had "echoes" of the situation in 1995, when he was expelled from Labour shortly before the elections that were held that year. That expulsion surrounded allegations of him breaking rules at a candidate selection meeting.
Nottingham County Court eventually ruled in 1997 that he should be reinstated as a member, declaring Labour's previous decision void and ordering the party to pay Councillor Ahmed's court costs. It was alleged that Mr Ahmed had proposed a motion to consider council candidates for selection who had not been approved by the district party.
But Mr Ahmed denied making any such proposal. Nottingham County Court was told at the time that trouble had begun with a struggle between Mr Ahmed and then Labour MP for Nottingham East, John Heppell, for the right to be parliamentary candidate.
The clearing of his name meant that Hassan Ahmed made a return to Nottingham City Council in 2007, an authority which had now been under Labour's leadership since 1988. Mr Ahmed represented the Berridge ward at this time and as well as his local councillor duties, he was also given a position on the council's executive, serving as the portfolio holder for employment and skills.
Despite the four-year terms of Nottingham City Council, Mr Ahmed's time as a portfolio holder was briefly suspended after just two years when he stepped down in 2009. He had been arrested in the July of that year on suspicion of assault and sexual assault.
The Crown Prosecution Service said in the November of 2009 that there was "insufficient evidence for a realistic prospect of a conviction." He then returned to his portfolio holder role and also to the Labour Party, which had suspended him.
Upon his return to the council, Mr Ahmed said at the time: "From the beginning I have maintained that the allegations were false. I would like to thank colleagues on the executive board, council officers and people in my ward for being understanding and supportive."
But his return to office would only last until 2011, when Hassan Ahmed said he was standing down and not seeking re-election due to "family commitments and health concerns." A report critical of the way in which the council handled part of Mr Ahmed's portfolio was then published after he stood down as a councillor.
The District Auditor of the Audit Commission - a statutory body set up to monitor Government spending - said "rules were not followed, resulting in unsafe decision-making" in relation to the Future Jobs Fund. The £10m Future Jobs Fund was a Government job creation scheme which aimed to find 12-month employment placements for 1,000 people in the city, with wages and training costs met by the city council.
A Nottingham Post report at the time into the District Auditor's report said up to 10 percent of these placements were allocated to companies which had a connection with Mr Ahmed. These connections included one with Nottingham Training & Enterprise, initially known as Nottingham Community College, which Hassan Ahmed was a founder member of in 1993.
Upon his appointment as a portfolio holder, Hassan Ahmed said he would "sever" links with the college. But the District Auditor's reported noted "previous and ongoing involvement" and after stepping down as a councillor, Mr Ahmed was named on the renamed City College Nottingham website as the principal.
But in his recent interview with Nottinghamshire Live, Mr Ahmed dismissed the Future Jobs Fund saga, saying it arose as a result of people pursuing a "vendetta" against him." His period out of office this time again lasted around ten years, before standing as a candidate for the Radford ward in 2019 and winning.
Although still led by Labour, Nottingham City Council was now a very different authority. As one of the previous triumvirate who dominated Nottingham politics, Hassan Ahmed's colleague Jon Collins had now left the council whilst Graham Chapman was serving as a backbencher.
Since the 2019 election, one of the key focuses of Nottingham City Council has been dealing with the fallout from one of Jon Collins' key projects - Robin Hood Energy. Hassan Ahmed now acknowledges that the company could have been "handled better", but overall he still defends the leadership of Jon Collins at Nottingham City Council.
In terms of poor leadership, Hassan Ahmed has instead been blasting the current leader David Mellen, who he claimed had presided over an administration which had "wreaked havoc" on Nottingham and its people. It was this anger which Mr Ahmed said drove his ambitions to become the next leader.
In the event of Labour's success after May 4, Mr Ahmed said he would have launched a leadership challenge against David Mellen and was confident that he would have won. He claims this is the reason why Labour announced his suspension from the party in March.
Labour has vehemently denied this claim, with a source saying Mr Ahmed was expelled due to "support" of an organisation that has been proscribed by the party (Labour Against The Witch Hunt). Given the tight deadline before the election, Mr Ahmed soon accepted that he would not be on the ballot paper come May 4.
Mr Ahmed said this election would have been his "last hurrah" but in terms of the future, he says he is still confident that someone else will launch a successful leadership challenge against the current Nottingham City Council administration. This idea is one that has been given short shrift by David Mellen, who said: "Current Councillor Ahmed isn't standing for election in the council... the decision on who is the leader will be taken by those who are elected as Labour councillors."
After three terms of office in Nottingham City Council, each of them followed by allegations being made against him, the chances of an eventual comeback for 71-year-old Hassan Ahmed are slim. But following such an extraordinary career, it's a comeback that can't be ruled out and indeed which Hassan Ahmed was unable to do so himself in our recent interview, saying: "There are some already who are saying I should come back and contest a by-election if one comes up, but I'm not thinking about that, for now."
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