Ukip has been rocked by two more resignations, including that of its former general secretary, Jonathan Arnott MEP, who quit saying the party’s leader, Henry Bolton, was “not up to the job”.

Arnott left hours after a former close aide to Bolton also resigned, citing the leader’s relationship with Jo Marney, who sent racist text messages about Prince Harry’s fiancee, Meghan Markle.

Bolton has faced multiple calls to resign over his relationship with the model, whom he met on Boxing Day and subsequently left his wife and children for. He has claimed to have ended his relationship with Marney though the pair were recently photographed together.

On Thursday, Bolton accused party members of plotting “an organised coup” against him after he was seen having dinner with his former girlfriend in Westminster.

Ahead of a meeting of the party’s national executive committee on Sunday to consider Bolton’s future, Arnott, who has previously expressed disquiet over the party’s anti-Islam direction, said he had lost faith in the leader but said his rivals “jockeying for position and hoping to take his job would be no better”.

“My party has, over the last year, significantly shifted its position on cultural and religious issues. This has, as is a matter of public record, placed it at considerable variance with my own views,” he said.

Arnott said he had watched the leadership of Ukip with despair over the past few years, pointing to former leaders and candidates Steven Woolfe, who withdrew after an assault; Diane James, the leader who quit after 18 days; John Rees-Evans, the leadership candidate who offered to pay dual-nationals to leave the country; and anti-Islam campaigner Anne-Marie Waters as low moments.

Arnott said the party had become “almost as bad as the political establishment I had hoped to counter” and said he was resigning “with a heavy heart” and would continue to sit as an independent in the European parliament.



“I tried my best to avoid the nastiness that pervades modern politics,” he said. “I, like so many others, believed it to have potential and I continued to believe in that potential long after the evidence no longer supported it – out of loyalty to the many honest, hard-working members who still believed in it.”

Bolton’s position was further undermined on Friday by the resignation of his former campaign manager Susie Govett.

Govett, a Ukip councillor in Shepway, has said she will quit the party and sit as an independent. “The reputation of Ukip, its members, councillors, supporters and voters has been, and will continue to be, damaged by the recent events surrounding Henry Bolton,” she said in a statement.

“Party members deserve so much more than what the leadership has delivered and I believe the harm to be irreparable.”

The party may also struggle to afford what would be its fourth leadership contest since Nigel Farage resigned in 2016. Ukip received only £25,140 in cash donations in the final three months of 2016, according to Electoral Commission data.

One party source told HuffPost UK a new leadership election would cost up to £60,000 and might lead to staff redundancies.

In the party’s most recent leadership election, candidates were required to put down a deposit of £5,000. Only two of the six candidates reached the 20% threshold needed for the deposit to be returned.

Bolton has mounted a fightback on social media over the past 24 hours. On Facebook, he posted a message of support from the party’s Leeds branch, saying: “After a string of leadership changes the last thing Ukip needs now is another one. In that respect we are in the same situation as the Conservatives.

“I want to see our leader stay and get on with the job he set out to do and this is the majority opinion among Ukip members here.”

