SELF-STYLED anti-corruption candidate Andy Erlam has wasted no time in seeking to capitalise on his high profile in the campaign to sack Tower Hamlets elected mayor Lutfur Rahman.

Erlam has indicated that he will stand for the vacancy created by Election Commissioner Richard Mawrey who has overturned the votes of Tower Hamlets residents to give Rahman his marching orders.

The Morning Star has no truck with corruption, which is why our paper made clear its disgust for MPs who fiddled their expenses and called for prosecution of the most flagrant offenders.

The parliamentary elite handled sticky-fingered MPs with kid gloves, asking them to refund some of their ill-gotten gains and welcoming one notorious fiddler back into the Cabinet.

Local authority elected representatives are judged far more strictly than MPs. If commissioners adjudge their actions unjustified, they can face criminal charges, can be surcharged and disqualified from office.

Election Commissioner Mawrey sat as judge, jury and executioner against Rahman, deeming him guilty, on the basis of a report by PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), of corruption, cronyism and so-called "spiritual influence."

Spiritual influence involves clerics instructing congregations to cast their votes in a particular direction.

If this took place in Tower Hamlets, is it the first instance of this happening in Britain?

Have Christian leaders never advised their flocks against supporting candidates linked to women's rights or "godless" communism?

But the accusation in Tower Hamlets concerns Muslims, which meshes with unsubstantiated and groundless allegations that Rahman has links to "extremists".

This slur forms part of a generalised attack on the Tower Hamlets mayor, accusing him of favouring areas with large Bangladeshi and Somali Muslim populations at the expense of others.

Former Labour London mayor Ken Livingstone, who knows a bit about murky allegations directed against campaigners who challenge the marginalisation of black communities, has rejected that charge.

In his view, such divisiveness has indeed been a problem - but before Rahman became mayor, not since.

"Lutfur has reached out to all communities," said Livingstone last November at a rally in opposition to the witch-hunt against Rahman.

When he launched free school meals in September 2013 for reception and year one pupils to ensure at least one hot and nutritious meal a day for 4,000 children from all backgrounds, this was not divisive.

It was in response to the School Food Plan report commissioned by then education secretary Michael Gove, however, ignored by government and all but a handful of local authorities.

Mayor Rahman's administration went one better last year, introducing universal free lunches to primary schools.

It also brought back the education maintenance allowance and provided bursaries for university entrants.

His "corrupt" regime built record numbers of affordable homes, paid all council staff the living wage and rescued 2,500 families from poverty or eviction because of the bedroom tax. No wonder Communities Secretary Eric Pickles hates all that Rahman stands for.

This reactionary buffoon called Rahman "a medieval monarch," ignoring the reality that he stood against Tory and Labour big battalions twice and carried public backing.

In contrast, Pickles set in train a loaded process that has cost Rahman dearly but, potentially, poor people in Tower Hamlets even more.

If he is guilty of the fraud of financial criminality that his detractors allege - but for which even PwC found no evidence - put him on trial.

Until that day, Rahman's sacking must be reversed and the democratic choice of the people respected.