SNP's Humza Yousaf at risk of leadership challenge just four months into the job
An SNP activist has vowed to challenge Humza Yousaf for leadership of the party as he pledges to give ordinary members more power to decide policy
Reuters
An SNP activist has vowed to challenge Humza Yousaf for leadership of the party as he pledges to give ordinary members more power to decide policy.
Secretary of the West Fife and Coastal Villages SNP branch, Chris Hanlon has launched his party leadership bid.
He is soliciting nominations online and needs just 100 nominations to lead to a second leadership contest for the party in the space of six months.
Hanlon said: “The job of party leader is to implement party policy, all of party policy and nothing but party policy.
The potential leadership contest follows concerns raised by some members in the party over how to achieve its central aim of independence
PA"Party policy is decided by conference.
"If, like me, you are concerned that leadership spends too much time pontificating about what they claim party policy is rather than waiting for members to decide.
"Or telling journalists that the decision hasn’t been made yet and that questions about the specific details of the independence election will have to wait till conference, I’d like to hear from you.”
Hanlon took on the role of national policy convener, from Alyn Smith in 2020 and said Yousaf had “promised to listen” when he was elected leader and that the membership “should make it clear that his position is conditional on living up to that promise”.
He added he had not “made any decisions” as he urged people who “feel, as I do, that feet need to be held to the fire” to give him their support.
An SNP source told the Daily Record: “Every member has a right to put themselves forward for party positions – no matter the odds of prevailing.”
It follows concerns raised by some members in the party over how to achieve its central aim of independence.
Earlier this month, MP Angus MacNeil was suspended after he declined to rejoin the SNP's Westminster group.
First Minister of Scotland Humza Yousaf during a visit to Bellshill in North LanarkshirePAHe complained the party was "clueless" about independence.
Yousaf won by a 52 per cent majority of SNP members earlier this year after Nicola Sturgeon resigned after eight years as first minister.
He fought off rivals Kate Forbes and Ash Regan when the votes of people who backed Regan, the former community safety minister, were redistributed following a first round where no candidate won the support of more than half the membership.