Yesterday, at Eastleigh in the United Kingdom, the United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) achieved their best ever result in a constituency election for the British parliament. They came a very close second behind the Liberal Democrats and increased their share of the vote in the constituency by over 24 percent. In short, UKIP very nearly won their first seat in the UK parliament and, even though they were second, this is a very great moment in the party’s short history.

In light of their excellent performance I now expect the leader of UKIP, Nigel Farage (in picture), to personally write to the Prime Minister of Romania to express his heartfelt thanks to the people of Romania for playing a crucial role in the party’s successful election campaign. By being able to generally defame, insult and lie about the people of Romania and their country Mr Farage, his colleagues and their rabid supporters in certain sections of the British media, were able to scare almost enough incurious British citizens in Eastleigh into voting for UKIP.

Indeed, perhaps Mr Farage will take out full page adverts and a few minutes airtime across the Romanian media to thank Romanians directly, in the style of Mr Diaconescu. I can’t wait…

There used to be few more pitiful sights in politics than a politician without vision viciously attacking people that he had never met in order to scrape together a few votes. These days the pitiful seems to have become accepted normal behavior and it is a great shame that British political parties appear to be leading the way in deploying this disgusting practice at the core of their activity. This unfortunate development can be regarded as a function of general decline.

Nonetheless, I can promise you that there is more to come as, in the UK, there will be local government elections later this year and the possibility of a general election in the near future as the current coalition government at Westminster becomes more susceptible to instability. We can look forward to many more lies and insults coming Romania’s way as UKIP pursues its anti-EU agenda through a campaign of scapegoating that forces the larger Conservative party to do the same in the hope of retaining the initiative on European policy.

I’m not sure what Romania’s best response to this loathsome behavior should be, other than to stare these people straight in the eye and feel sorry for them. What I can tell you is that the United Kingdom is in deep political trouble over the issue of EU membership, the possibility of Scotland becoming independent, a collapsing health service, huge levels of debt and the vast and widening gap between rich and poor across the country.

And British weather remains generally dreadful.

By Ronnie Smith, Guest Writer

Ronnie Smith is Scottish and now lives in Romania, working as a professional training business consultant and communication coach. He is also a teacher of political science, a political and social commentator and a writer of fiction. The views expressed are his own and do not necessarily reflect those of Romania Insider.com or of any other people or companies mentioned in this article, unless stated so.

(photo source: UKIP’s photo stream on Flickr)