This week, a Sky News video has been doing the rounds on Twitter in which an exasperated Jeremy Corbyn supporter cast doubt on the row over the ongoing wreath-laying controversy by declaring that the Labour leader is a recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize. End of.
https://twitter.com/Jamin2g/status/1029448470028013570
Just in case readers are in any doubt, Mr S can confirm this claim is not true. But Mr S thinks he can guess where it came from.
A few months ago, Corbyn’s supporters began to rebut questions about his commitment to peace by asserting that he was a winner of the Gandhi Peace Prize. The prize is bestowed annually by the Indian government for ‘contributions towards social, economic and political transformation through non-violence and other Gandhian methods’. Past winners include Nelson Mandela, Václav Havel, and Desmond Tutu.
A cursory Google yields that it was in fact never awarded to Corbyn. But in 2013 he was given the Gandhi Foundation International Peace Award. The prize was bestowed by the Gandhi Foundation at a ceremony in Portcullis House—his place of work. The foundation is run from a community centre in Bromley and brands itself as ‘the UK’s leading Gandhi organisation’.
Once Jeremy’s award had, in the minds of his base, morphed into a prestigious one of a similar name, it was only a small leap to Nobel laureateship and the most prestigious peace award in the world.
An ‘easy mistake to make’, as one Twitter user insisted. It seems to be a recurring theme when it comes to Corbyn these days.
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