Alba has been urged to pull a tribute to Alex Salmond over the inclusion of an internet troll convicted of sending threatening messages. David Llewellyn is part of a memorial video despite a “sinister” post calling for SNP Cabinet Secretary Angus Robertson to be dumped in Edinburgh’s Water of Leith.
A Scottish Greens spokesperson said: “With the rise of the far-right dragging Scottish politics to extreme levels of toxicity, the last thing we need is for parties to be platforming dangerous ideas and individuals who would say things like this. There is no place for hatred or violence in our country. For a party that claims to care about Scotland’s democracy, this is a bad move which they should reconsider.”
Salmond was an SNP First Minister for seven years before a bitter dispute with Nicola Sturgeon led to him forming pro-independence rival Alba. He died of a heart attack in North Macedonia last year and Alba’s official tribute includes allies talking about their memories of the man.
But the homage also includes a contribution from an activist who received a court warning following a conviction in 2022. In the tribute, Llewellyn raised the court action Salmond was planning against the SNP Government over their botched probe into sexual harassment claims against him:
“There is going to be a court case sometime soon. And at the end of the day, we will win. We are not doing it for us. We are not even doing it for vengeance, although it’s pretty damn close sometimes.”
In a nod to Salmond’s criminal trial, which saw him acquitted, he said: “I sat in that court every day and watched that man, and I’ll tell you what, what they put him through, that needs to be sorted. And we need to get behind the whole thing. Thank you very much.”
Llewellyn had been found guilty of posting an obscene picture relating to former MP George Galloway and of behaving in a threatening or abusive manner in remarks about Robertson and his wife.
One of his posts stated: “If you ever see him [Mr Galloway] under a Union Jack with a Tory then please shoot him”. He also posted a picture of the former MP’s face photoshopped onto an image of a man having sex with an animal. He used Facebook to state that Robertson and his spouse should be “dumped” in a river in the Capital.
The sentence was deferred after his trial at Edinburgh Sheriff Court and he was admonished. The conviction will appear on his criminal record.
Sheriff Fiona Reith QC said after the conviction: “I was satisfied, as was submitted by the procurator fiscal depute at trial, that the plain meaning of the words was to the effect that it was time for both Mr and Mrs Robertson to have violence visited upon them in the form of being dumped in the Water of Leith, and that the message had a sinister tenor to it.”
Weeks after his conviction, an unrepentant Lllewellyn spoke at an Alba conference in Stirling. He told delegates: “Last time I stood before you, I started off with ‘I’m a criminal’. Guess what, I am again. Three weeks ago, four weeks ago, I was up in court, where I was found guilty basically of freedom of speech.
“I was originally charged with threatening to kill somebody and eventually what they found me guilty of was a breach of the peace kind of thing…basically I got a year’s social work.
“And that’s what I got for threatening to kill somebody, apparently. It was political. It was a political attack.”
The Record last week published a story about Salmond’s elderly widow Moira and Ahmed-Sheikh falling out over the return of the former SNP leader’s phone following his death.
A message was published on Llewellyn’s X account after our article came out: “The continuous monstering of an 87 year old grieving widow has me wishing a fire would break out at Record headquarters with all their staff inside.” Alba MSP Ash Regan and former party MP Kenny MacAskill are contesting the vacant leadership.
Tory MSP Annie Wells said: “Alba clearly think it’s fine to double down on giving a platform to this convicted criminal. It is clear he has not learned any lessons despite being previously punished. They should do the right thing and cut ties with him.”
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