On Tuesday, nearly 136 years after his death, somebody decided to stop the rise of communism by trashing Karl Marx’s gravestone before it’s too late.

It’s a weird time to do it. Who could be mad enough at him that they want vengeance, given that he is, at most, fairly politically inactive as a corpse? The perpetrator is believed to have used a hammer, not even paying him the respect of also using a sickle, so they must really hate the guy.

During Marx’s lifetime he made a lot of enemies, even leaving aside the whole “giving birth to communism” thing.

He sponged money off Engels for decades, something which probably didn’t endear him to Engels, as he was forced to steal petty cash to give to Marx, which Marx would then blow on ale. One day, after getting his housemaid pregnant, he made Engels take the blame so that his own wife wouldn’t find out. And that was his best friend.

A friend he was less close to he let fight a duel on his behalf, which saw him get a bullet in the head – all because Marx had been mildly insulted in public.

Strangers had reason to not like Marx, too. With a massive beard he refused to get cut and underpants he refused to change even once a week, it’s fair to say barbers and people in the general vicinity were also not fans. By the end of his life he had been expelled from at least three countries.

So it would be understandable if his grave had been trashed when he was alive, but it’s a bit weird now that he’s dead. Who would do such a thing? Well, let me take you through the obvious suspects.

The hard Brexiteers

Motive: Marx has been sponging off our cemetery reparation fund for over 100 years now and his name sounds sort of foreign. He’s taking the place of a British person who could one day easily do the job of being notably dead. Why not reserve the slot for a proper British thinker like Lee Hurst?

Means: There is literally zero chance one of these creeps isn’t friends with a gravedigger.

Opportunity: If you saw John Redwood in a graveyard you’d assume he’s there in his capacity as the vampire who turned Rees-Mogg.

A Corbyn fan

Motive: Marx wrote a full three volumes of books about capitalism before concluding it was bad, the telltale sign of a Blairite centrist melt.

He also famously wrote “workers of the world, unite” in the Communist Manifesto, which sounds suspiciously pro-freedom of movement, something Corbyn is not necessarily on board with. Marx has frequently been found out of line with true lefty ideals, which as we all know is whatever Corbyn is thinking of this week. Time to alienate this centrist commie’s corpse from its grave.

Means: Solid and dependable, hammers are a tool for the many, not the few.

Opportunity: Nobody would raise an eyebrow when a guy with a “Corbyn in a Che Guevara hat” T-shirt goes to Marx’s grave for a bit of a cry.

The FBPE brigade

Motive: They tried hashtags, further hashtags, some emojis and singing songs while dressed in a sexy Batman outfit and nothing has worked: Corbyn still won’t give them a #peoplesvote #waton #revokearticle50.

If you look at the grave you’ll notice the notch-marks are tiny. Why smash the grave with such a small hammer? Yep, that’s right, they were trying to chip out another hashtag (#followbacksmashmarx) in the one place Corbyn is guaranteed to take notice – his precious grandad’s grave.

Means: If you’re upper-middle class you can probably hire somebody with a hammer.

Opportunity: They just quit their job to “fight Brexit” by tweeting at it, and the graveyard has excellent wifi.

The Turning Point students

Motive: Fresh off their famously edgy slogan “socialism sucks”, everybody’s favourite new edgelords needed another belter, but all they could come up with was their derivative secondary slogan “big government sucks”.

Fearing they were losing their reputation as the badasses of people who happen to still have nannies, the group clearly sat down and thought “what’s edgier than being a Ukip member at the age of 10? Trashing gravestones, that’s what.”

Sadly they later found out that they were merely acting out the truest spirit of Marx himself by getting drunk and smashing up private property.

Means: One of their bigger friends says they can do a push up. If he’s not lying (like he did about having that Canadian girlfriend from another school) then there’s a good chance he can swing a hammer.

Opportunity: They’re at that age where they start to go on field trips.

Solution: It was the cabinet

Motive: Chequers has become a bit boring as an away day. Why not spice things up by having a team building exercise where they smash up the graves of famous communists? Besides, if anyone needs a distraction it’s a government that can’t even try to inspect a port without being banned from entering Calais.

Means: Let’s face it, if anyone is going to trash history on purpose only to do a slightly shit job of it and then flee, it’s the cabinet. They’ve spent three years doing precisely this: it’s the only thing they’re good at at this stage.

If it turns out the reason the hammering was so crappy is because someone had accidentally brought along a Phillips-head screwdriver, then this plan has Chris Grayling written all over it.

Opportunity: If anyone asked why they were there, Theresa May could chisel “fit for work” on the nearest grave – and not a single person wouldn’t believe they were there on behalf of the DWP.

• James Felton is a TV and radio comedy writer