When Tuesday comes

On Saturday morning the BNP website carried one of those venomously torrid articles in which it seems to specialise, which baldly stated that "disgraced" former webmaster Simon Bennett had stolen the BNP's email list and that legal action was being taken against him.

Some time during the afternoon the post (along with a lone "Hang him!" comment from a BNP nematode) disappeared into the cyber-ether, promoting an article on the failure of the CPS to prosecute BNP street thug and drink-driver Bob Bailey to lead story.

The BNP has a long history of threatening (or at least informing its gullible members that it is about to take) legal action against some person or entity, and almost always failing to do so. From memory, I believe we recorded three examples over the spring and summer of 2009, one of which included a promise to put the "lying" Daily Mirror in court for its coverage of "BNP mum" and female thug Helen Forster, who the BNP denied was a member after her conviction for the intimidation of neighbour Mrs Meherjan Miah was reported in the newspaper. The BNP despatched the long forgotten "Operation Fightback" in the form of lying Paul Golding to film an interview with lying Helen Forster, both of them brazenly continuing to deny Forster's BNP membership. Within hours of the film and the BNP's threats against the Mirror appearing on the party website, "Helen Forster" was recognised as "Helen Colclough" - BNP activist, and perfectly well known to Golding. The story quickly disappeared.

Why the BNP got cold feet after publishing its blunt accusation of theft against Simon Bennett we do not know. The normally voluble Bennett, prone to engage in long and tedious online spats with various representatives of the Green Arrow nursery class, does not appear to have noticed, but since he did not break off from arranging boxing matches and informing the world that his father was "lifed off for murder when I was two years old" until 4.20 am, perhaps he was still in bed when the accusation was removed.

Since Bennett, like the party from which he is estranged, is given to promising action which never materialises, it is unlikely that the highly libellous accusation was removed from the BNP website through any fear of him launching a legal action. It might have been taken down when somebody sobered up and realised what counter-productive hysterical nonsense it was, or because it was realised that the idea of the BNP having the financial wherewithal to launch a legal action against anybody would produce an avalanche of laughter from one end of the BNP to the other (Paul Morris and company excepted), as Nick Griffin had admitted that the BNP was skint and sinking just the day before.

Visitors to the BNP website cannot have failed to notice that despite repeated appeals from Griffin the BNP's EHRC Fighting Fund, with a target set at £30,000, has remained stubbornly stuck at the £10,000 mark - itself a highly dubious figure.

Griffin's latest appeal drips utter desperation in every word. "We need to raise £150,000 to keep the wolves at bay and to ensure our survival," he pleads.

He's clearly not going to get it unless some deranged benefactor with a penchant for lost causes comes to the rescue.

The parlous state of the BNP is frankly admitted by Griffin's close friend Tony Lecomber, who posts on the British Democracy Forum as BNPhappy:

Activism has already dried up. Last month the whole of the East Mids got 4 enquiries and the whole of the North East got two! Whole branches are likely going to fold. When the fence sitters see this, they are going to get disheartened and also drift away. The knock on effect of this is that, ironically, those who have been loyal to Nick will then also get disheartened and many of those will drop out.

The Shelley Rose episode appears to have been the final straw for many "fence sitters", particularly in the light of Jim Dowson's craven and very public failure either to refute Rose's allegations or to begin proceedings against her. Commenting on the Green Arrow website - one of the few places on the planet he can count on an uncritical hearing - Dowson lamely challenges Rose to go to the police, then claims that she is not worth "200 or 300k fees in clearing my name" - figures plucked out of thin air by a man clearly writhing in deep discomfort.

Dowson's curiously non-combative attitude has only lent weight to Rose's claims, and will boost Eddy Butler's leadership campaign as the nomination gathering process draws to a close.

In the midst of all this fascist angst has come the expulsion of Mark Collett, a matter that once would have occupied several posts on this website but which - though Collett is central to the current turmoil - seems scarcely worthy of a sentence. It is, of course, as we haven't heard the last of Collett (allegedly owed £20,000 by the BNP), who is involved in Eddy Butler's campaign but who, for the negative emotions he excites, is wisely being kept from view.

To cover for the fact that the police and CPS dropped the Griffin/Dowson inspired "death threat" charges against Collett for lack of evidence, Griffin's camp are suggesting that a private prosecution may be started against Collett. We don't expect to be reporting any such case any time soon.

The nominations deadline is Tuesday, when it should become clear whether or not Eddy Butler has gathered his required 20% voting member signatures. His last call for support has the urgent air of a Nick Griffin appeal for donations. It does not ooze confidence, but then Butler has been understandably tight-lipped on the matter of exactly how many nomination signatures he has gathered to date.

If he cannot gather 840 signatures then there is no challenge. Even if he does there is the tantalising question of whether scrutineer Andrew Brons will accept those submitted on Butler's own forms, as we understand that Brons is far from happy with the nomination procedure imposed by Nick Griffin.

Whatever happens, Tuesday will prove one of the most notable days in the history of the BNP, and the party's civil war is certain erupt into ever higher levels of viciousness. Stay with us for news of the endgame as it plays out.