Reform lost their businessman – what does this mean for the party?
Barely a week ago, Zia Yusuf was hosting journalists in the City, trying to sell them on Reform’s crypto plan.
But things quickly went awry for the Reform party chairman.
On Wednesday, Yusuf publicly contradicted Reform MP Sarah Pochin’s call in Parliament for a burqa ban. On Thursday, he resigned.
The chairman announced he was stepping down at the locus of much Reform campaigning: on X.
“I no longer believe working to get a Reform government elected is a good use of my time, and hereby resign the office,” Yusuf said, while boasting having quadrupled the party’s membership and doubling its performance on the polls in just under a year.
Yusuf’s resignation suggests Reform’s party line was not clearly translating across its ranks. He said he was not aware of Potchin’s question to the Prime Minister, nor what the party stance was on a burqa ban.
Yusuf added that he considered it “dumb” to “ask the PM if they would do something the party itself wouldn’t do.”
DOGE’s dinner
Pochin’s burqa issue had nothing to do with him, Yusuf insisted. “I’m busy with UK DOGE.”
DOGE, or the Department of Government Efficiency, refers to US efforts spearheaded by multi-billionaire Elon Musk to rid the government of “wasteful spending.”
As part of these efforts, Yusuf promised to cut £300-400bn within one Parliament.
When asked by Sky where the cuts would be made, Yusuf said they are “going to be distributed and found across all of the – look, you look at any large business, they are constantly able to make savings, partly through technology, partly through AI. I actually think the number could be much higher than 5 per cent.”
Reform leader Nigel Farage said Yusuf’s absence will leave a “gap … particularly around DOGE.”
“I was the one going around the county saying every county needs a DOGE, and he was the guy actually trying to put it into action,” Farage said.
Kent, which turned Reform-blue after the recent local elections, was the first target of UK DOGE.
Yusuf took to social media to highlight the “fraud” Reform claimed to have uncovered in the Kent County Council they inherited. “What a racket,” Yusuf said.
The Lib Dems said Yusuf “sacking himself” constituted “leading UK DOGE by example.”
Credibility at stake
The eulogy-style odes to Yusuf’s credentials and contributions to the party quickly filed in.
Reform UK leader Nigel Farage said he was “genuinely sorry” that Yusuf had opted to step down, lauding him as “a huge factor” in Reform’s local electoral performance, and “an enormously talented person.”
Reform swept 677 seats in May’s local elections, firmly promoting the insurgent party as a real threat to incumbents.
Yusuf, who used to work at Goldman Sachs, was styled as the experienced businessman who could professionalise the party.
After his stint at the investment bank, Yusuf went on to co-found a luxury concierge company, Velocity Black, which he sold for £233m.
But for the Reform head, Yusuf’s background put him at odds with a career in politics. Yusuf’s “Goldman Sachs mentality” was unsuited for managing a political team, Farage said.
Despite Reform’s stated ambitions to introduce ‘efficiency’ into government, Farage said: “Politics isn’t just about creating a financial bottom line, it’s about doing things that are thoughtful, creative and different.”
Farage implied Yusuf was unable to hack the heat in the kitchen, adding that “politics can be a highly pressured and difficult game and Zia has clearly had enough.”
“There are many other businessmen before him who’ve come into politics, and just decided at the end … they don’t need the abuse.”
Farage likened Yusuf’s resignation to Musk’s departure this week from the White House – “he’s walked away as well.”
In a bid to rebrand the party as more than a single-issue movement, Reform recently unveiled a tranche of economic policies which have been criticised by political opponents and economic authorities alike.
“The Reform Chair has done a runner so that he doesn’t have to front up Farage’s £80 billion in unfunded cuts, which would spark a Liz Truss-style economic meltdown,” a Labour spokesperson said.
Reform’s racism problem
“I don’t think it’s amicable from [Yusuf’s] perspective,” Farage admitted. “Not everyone liked him.”
Reform, a party which campaigns largely against immigration, has some more extreme flanks amongst its voters, many of which disapproved of a “non-British” party chairman.
Farage cited a “persistent campaign” against Yusuf on social media, particularly from the “alt-right,” which led some Reform voters to “question his motives.”
Yusuf’s tokenistic occupation of a visible party role helped broaden the party’s appeal outside of the white British population.
Denying any animosity on religious grounds, Pochin said: “Zia has been a great friend and colleague during my short time as the MP for Runcorn and Helsby.”
Keeping the team together
For Reform’s opponents, discord within the party’s ranks constitutes a political opportunity. “Reform is not a political party. It is a fan club,” Tory leader Kemi Badenoch said of Yusuf’s resignation.
If the party continues to turnover some of its main actors, this will raise questions around Farage’s ability to keep the party together long enough to lead it to electoral victory.
“Reform are just not serious,” a Labour official said.
“If Nigel Farage can’t manage a handful of politicians, how on earth could he run a country? He has fallen out with everyone he has ever worked with.”
A Tory official joked that “Nigel Farage tells us he wants to run the country, he can’t even run a party small enough to fit in a Nissan Micra. Will the last person in Reform UK who isn’t Farage please turn out the lights?”
Farage is known to have been embroiled in a litany of feuds throughout his political career, casting doubt on his ability to be anything more than a “messiah,” in Lowe’s words.
The Lib Dems accused Reform of having “copied the Conservative playbook of fighting like rats in a sack.”
Reform Deputy Richard Tice countered accusations of chaos with assurances that the party was doing “rather well.”
It’s not the first time Yusuf has been embroiled in an internecine conflict. The chairman was at loggerheads with ex-Reform MP Rupert Lowe, where Yusuf accused Lowe of having lobbed threats of physical violence towards him, which Lowe denies.
Lowe can be seen celebrating in the comment section of Yusuf’s resignation announcement.