BREAKING: Chris McEleny is fired as General Secretary of the Alba Party for "gross misconduct" after his hapless coup attempt ends in total catastrophe, both for himself and the party as a whole - which has now entered a state of outright civil war

As his idol across the water would have said in his Apprentice days: "Christopher, you're fired."

I hate to say "I told you so", but none of this would have happened if the Alba top brass had simply listened to the "wee gang of malcontents" - not just me, but so many others as well who have either been expelled or driven out of the party by bullying.  None of the chaos that Chris McEleny has unleashed within the party in recent weeks would even have been possible if our calls for internal democratisation and for reform of the Kafkaesque disciplinary procedure had been heeded.  McEleny has only been able to act with such impunity because of Alba's toxic authoritarian culture, which has allowed the constitution to be breached and party officials to exceed the limits of their powers again, and again, and again.

Technically the situation now is that McEleny is "suspended" from his position of General Secretary, so theoretically he could return if the disciplinary proceedings work out in his favour, but clearly that is not going to happen.  Make no mistake - he has been fired by Kenny MacAskill and that's an end to it.  There is no way back for him as General Secretary, and there is no way back for him in any form whatsoever within the Alba Party.  If you launch a coup against your own party leader (even an acting leader), you have to get it right within the first five seconds, otherwise you've blown it forever.  

McEleny's dreams of acting as the éminence grise for an Ash Regan-led Alba, and of becoming an Alba list MSP next year, now lie in tatters.  He is extraordinarily ambitious and is highly unlikely to abandon his personal goals even at this stage, but to fulfil them he's going to have to join another party - which leads me to the inexorable conclusion that he will strongly consider renouncing independence in order to join Reform UK, because that is the only party he could plausibly join which would offer him a realistic chance of winning a seat at Holyrood.

This episode must finally put an end to the ludicrous pretence from the MacAskill faction of the party that Alba has been functioning as a normal political party over the last eighteen months.  McEleny was the driving force behind numerous malicious expulsions and lengthy suspensions - not just me, but also Geoff Bush, Sean Davis, Denise Somerville and Colin Alexander.  All of those spurious "upheld complaints" should now be overturned and apologies issued, and anyone who wishes to rejoin Alba should be allowed to do so.  That includes the larger list of people who McEleny falsely certified as having "publicly resigned from the party" in order to bypass the disciplinary machinery altogether.  I've rejoined the SNP since my expulsion and am extremely happy with that decision, but I believe the others are for the most part politically homeless at present.  That is totally unfair on them and a dreadful injustice should now be put right.

I can't help but raise a rather ironic smile at the revelation that a specific component of the "gross misconduct" charge against McEleny is that he gave the impression that Alba supported the Tories in their bid to deprive asylum seekers of free bus travel.  Er, didn't I raise concerns on this blog at the time that McEleny was flirting with far-right rhetoric and that Alba consequently risked mutating from its social democratic roots?  And wasn't I shouted down and ridiculed for that by Alba HQ's Robert Reid, known to be a strong MacAskill supporter?  If you're reading this, Robert - what total hypocrisy on your part.  Total hypocrisy, and you should hang your head in shame.

I was speaking last night to some former Alba members, and I said to them that there was a strange paradox about McEleny.  Most of us had sat in committee meetings with him at some point or another and seen how he remains completely calm and collected when he sticks the knife in.  He never raises his voice or shows any emotion.  You'd think such a man would have brilliant tactics to match his icy temperament, but that's where it all falls apart - his cunning plans are all Baldrick-like and invariably blow up in his face.  Did he really not foresee that absolutely everyone would work out within two seconds that he was the "disgruntled senior employee" quoted by the Sunday Mail briefing against Mr MacAskill?  Did he really believe that he would get away with taking bogus "disciplinary action" against the acting party leader - an action I struggle to think of any precedent for in any UK political party?

It was an attempted coup, that's for sure - the idea would have been that Mr MacAskill's leadership bid might prove untenable if he was suspended in some form or another.  But as I've mentioned quite a few times, 75% of the four members of the Disciplinary Committee who voted for my own expulsion in early December were Robert Reid's mum (Jackie Reid), or Robert Reid's girlfriend (Christina Hendry), or Alex Salmond's niece (Christina Hendry again), or directly appointed to the committee by Alex Salmond (both Christina Hendry and Josh Robertson).  The idea that those people were ever going to suspend Kenny MacAskill is just barking mad.  Maybe McEleny thought a temporary suspension pending the disciplinary hearing would be enough to do the trick?  Well, no, that makes no sense, because Mr MacAskill always had enough supporters on the NEC to overturn a temporary suspension.  It was just never going to work.  It was the sort of coup Mr Bean or Frank Spencer would have attempted, and the outcome is utterly predictable to everyone apart from the man himself.

I follow the Moskva

Down to Gorky Park

Listening to the wind of CHA-ANGE

An August summer night

Soldiers passing by

Listening to the wind of CHA-ANGE

Take me 

To the magic of the moment

On a glory night

Where the children of tomorrow dream away (dream away)

In the wind of CHANGE

Mmmmm