Gang Members Infiltrated Political Party to Oust Chairman Who Was Tough on Crime, Report Claims

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Chris Tomlinson

A group of around 50 people, said to speak little Swedish and linked to criminal gangs, joined the Social Democrats in a Stockholm area town to oust a local politician who had been tough on gang crime.

Ebba Östlin, chairman of the municipal board in Botkyrka, a town in the southern Stockholm region, was ousted from her position after a group of 50 or so new members of the Social Democrats voted her out by a margin of 91 to 88, it is said.

Many of the people involved in the group of new members of the party are allegedly linked to gang criminals and apparently barely speak Swedish, according to an article by Oisín Cantwell, a columnist for the Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet.

According to the columnist, one of the people involved in the vote was a member of the notorious Vårby network, which has been linked to rapper Yasin Mahamoud, who was arrested on suspicion of trying to kidnap another rapper in 2021.

Various members of the Vårby network have also been sentenced for a litany of crimes, including attempted murders, serious drug offences and weapons offences.

According to a local source in Botkyrka, Östlin was targetted for ousting after she had cracked down on youth and leisure clubs after a report had revealed that people with convictions for serious crimes had been hired at the centres and members of the Vårby network had been using the centres.

“There are many indications that organised crime may have taken part in the dismissal of the leading politician in the municipality. It’s unheard of. That is unacceptable. What happens to Botkyrka if a Social Democrat who is indebted to the Vårby network takes over?” Cantwell wrote.

There is an ongoing surge of gang violence in the Stockholm region since the Christmas Day fatal shooting of well-known gangster Mehdi ”Dumle” Sachit, with a Botkyrka in an industrial area of Botkyrka reported last Thursday.

Over the weekend, a 15-year-old was shot dead at the Skogås centre shopping mall in Huddinge, south of Stockholm in what police believe was connected to the ongoing gang conflicts in the Stockholm region.

“We see that young people are the ones who resort to violence in the streets and squares. Sometimes they do it of their own volition, sometimes out of fear and sometimes because they are forced or threatened by the older ones to act,” Max Åkerwall, commander of the Stockholm police, said.

 

Follow Chris Tomlinson on Twitter at @TomlinsonCJ or email at ctomlinson(at)breitbart.com.

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