Has Labour given up fighting Nigel Farage in Clacton? Candidate Jovan Owusu-Nepaul ‘sent to West Midlands’

Labour appears to have given up the fight against Nigel Farage’s bid to become the MP for Clacton.

The party has reportedly ‘seconded’ its candidate from the seaside constituency in Essex to campaign in the West Midlands, suggesting Labour has conceded defeat to the Reform UK leader before polling day.

It comes after the Labour candidate for the seat, Jovan Owusu-Nepaul, went viral on social media, being dubbed “the best dressed candidate in living memory”. He was also named by anti-Brexit campaign group Best for Britain as the candidate in the strongest position to stop Mr Farage’s bid to become an MP for the first time.

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But a campaign source told The Guardian Labour officials were “furious with him getting more retweets than Keir Starmer”, believing him to be distracting from the Labour leader’s campaign.

And, in a letter to Labour’s general secretary David Evans and seen by the newspaper, Mr Owusu-Nepaul’s election agent Martin Suker said: “Jovan was told [by an official] to never come back to Clacton, and yesterday, was instructed to move to the West Midlands region.”

Mr Owusu-Nepaul has yet to comment on the claims.

Mr Suker said Reform “stands for everything the Labour Party stands against” and he was “struggling to come to terms that it appears the party doesn’t even want to be seen to be putting up a fight”.

Clacton was won in 2019 by Tory Giles Watling with a 24,702 majority, but it is widely expected Mr Farage is to win the seat on 4 July.

But Best for Britain chief Naomi Smith said that previous votes in the area showed that there had been strong Labour support in Harwich, part of the Clacton seat, which “was suppressed by Brexit”.

She said: “Our analysis shows that if the Greens and Lib Dems vote Labour then Labour can come through the middle and win Clacton.”

As recently as 10 days ago, Mr Jovan wrote on social media platform X: “We can stop Farage.”

It is understood Clacton was never a target seat for Labour, meaning it was seen as unwinnable and not one the party would devote resources to. Mr Owusu-Nepaul and Labour have been contacted for comment.

A Labour party spokesperson told TheGuardian: “We are working hard to deliver as many Labour MPs as possible in the general election and our campaigners are bringing our message of change to people across the country.”