Speaking in their first broadcast interview, five former Dulwich College students told ITV News they felt compelled to sign the open letter and come forward with their allegations of Farage’s racist and antisemitic abuse. ITV News Political Correspondent Harry Horton reports
Words by Lauren Clarke, ITV News Content Editor
More than 20 former students and staff at Dulwich College have signed an open letter calling for Nigel Farage to apologise for his alleged racist and antisemitic behaviour while a pupil at the top London private school.
Speaking in their first broadcast interview, five former Dulwich College students told ITV News they felt compelled to come forward with their stories following repeated denials by the Reform UK leader and senior members of the party.
The open letter, published today in The Guardian, reads: “We are 26 of the former students (and teaching staff) at Dulwich College who have recently shared our memories of your racist and antisemitic behaviour at school from 1975 to 1982.
“We have recalled the verbal abuse you regularly directed at a number of pupils of Jewish, Black and Asian heritage; as well as loudly and proudly proclaiming your high regard for Fascist leaders and organisations, from Hitler to Mosley, from the Nazis to the National Front.”
The letter goes on to detail Farage and Reform’s recent denials before closing: “None of us has taken lightly the decision to speak up.
“It has been deeply troubling to revisit our memories, let alone to share them with journalists and the broader public.
“However, what disturbs us is less what happened years ago, hurtful as it was, but rather your refusal to acknowledge your past behaviour or apologise for it.
“We call on you now to recognise that these events happened, apologise for them, [and] make it clear you have renounced the racist, antisemitic and Fascist views you expressed at Dulwich.”
Speaking to ITV News, former Dulwich student Yinka Bankole alleges Farage targeted him aged ten, as one of a small number of black boys at the school.
Former Dulwich College student Yinka Bankole tells ITV News Nigel Farage racially abused him while a student
He said: “I will never forget the hateful look in his eyes.
“He’ll walk over in my direction and say, ‘Hey you, where are you from?’
“And you know, you ask a question, but before I could even give out an answer, I had, ‘That’s the way back to Africa.’
“And for me it happened once, okay, happened a second time, then a third time.”
Mr Bankole was speaking alongside four other former Dulwich students and signatories of the letter, including Bafta and Emmy-award winning director Peter Ettedgui.
Mr Ettedgui, who is Jewish, accuses Farage of antisemitic abuse while they were students together at the college in the late 1970s.
He said: “He started to sort of like sneer at me and very contemptuously say things like ‘Hitler was right’ and ‘Gas them’ and he’d add a long sibilance to sort of mimic the sound of gas.
“It was the most offensive antisemitic abuse that anyone ever said to me, either before or since.
“So I’ve never forgotten.”
Bafta and Emmy-award winning director Peter Ettedgui alleges the abuse he received from Nigel Farage was ‘the most offensive’ he has ever received
Today’s publication of the open letter follows weeks of allegations about the Reform UK leader’s conduct at school.
In November, Farage downplayed claims he used racist and antisemitic language as a teenager, saying he never ‘directly really tried to go and hurt anybody’.
When pressed further, the 61-year-old said: “Have I said things 50 years ago that you could interpret as being banter in a playground? That you could interpret in the modern light a day in some sort of way? Yes.
“Have I ever directly ever racially abused anybody? No.”
When challenged by ITV News and BBC journalists over the allegations in a press conference earlier this month, Farage responded with a tirade against both broadcasters – accusing them of “double standards” and suggesting the organisations had in the past aired programmes which would now be considered racist.
It was these comments from Nigel Farage that Mr Bankole says encouraged him to break his silence.
He told ITV News: “For me, the trigger was when I heard a conference referring to Bernard Manning.
“For me, I had been anonymous up to that point and I really didn’t want to come out, to be honest. I just wanted to do my work and get on with it.
“But when I heard that, it was such dishonesty, such nastiness, defending vulgarity like that.”
“I hear people classifying racism as intentional, not intentional. Direct, not direct. Insulting, not insulting.
“All sorts of ways to describe an act that the person, the perpetrator, knows is wrong.”
Former Dulwich College students Yinka Bankole and Jean-Pierre Lihou say Nigel Farage’s press conference earlier this month was a turning point for them
Fellow former Dulwich student Jean-Pierre Lihou, who has publicly accused Farage of antisemitic and racist behaviour when they were at school together, describes Farage and Reform UK’s denials as ‘wishy-washy’ and ‘vague’.
Mr Lihou said: “He knows what he said, we know what he said – and a lot of people have coincidentally the same memory.
“So the question is, who is telling a lie and who isn’t telling a lie?”
He added: “He is calling us liars, all 20 of us and more who have now put our names to [the letter].
“I have yet to see one name coming from Nigel in his defence. If he’s so sure of himself, why doesn’t he do that? We have.
“We’ve faced criticism online, in our professional work, we’ve come forward and doubtless, following this article, there’ll be even more.
“What is he afraid of?”
Responding to Wednesday’s open letter, a Reform UK spokesperson said: “These latest attacks are a naked attempt to discredit Reform and Nigel Farage.
“Instead of debating Reform on the substance of our ideas and policies, the left-wing media and deeply unpopular Labour Party are now using 50-year-old smears in a last act of desperation.
“The British public see right through this witch hunt.”
Jewish former student Stefan Bennaroch denies that the open letter and those who signed it are politically motivated.
He argues it is Reform UK who are politicising the issue.
He said: “As soon as Reform, rather than Farage himself, got involved in calling us liars, then it becomes political.
“Them accusing us of lies is a profound political statement of the most unpleasant kind and they have to be called out for it.”
Another former Dulwich student, Martin Rossel, denied that the open letter is politically motivated.
Mr Rossel, chair of the Liberal Democrats in Salisbury, told ITV News: “I’m not doing this as a political thing. I’m doing this because I had a very close friend at Dulwich called Norman Levinkind, who was Jewish.
“Norman sadly passed away in 1981, but Norman was on the receiving end of a lot of Nigel’s unpleasantness.
“I’m standing up for my friend now because I couldn’t then.
“I certainly saw Peter on the receiving end of it and I didn’t say anything then and now is my chance to do that.”
Responding to the allegations of Farage’s alleged behaviour, Dulwich College said “such behaviour is wholly incompatible with the values the college holds”.
In a letter to Mr Lihou, seen by ITV News, current college master Robert Milne wrote: “What we can unequivocally state, is that the behaviours described are entirely at odds with the Dulwich College of today.”
Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer has previously called Farage’s response to the allegations as “unconvincing to say the least” and urged the Reform UK leader to apologise to people he may have hurt.
Follow STV News on WhatsApp
Scan the QR code on your mobile device for all the latest news from around the country
