On Thursday, voters across England will elect over 5,000 councillors in approximately 3,000 wards from tens of thousands of candidates. However, only one candidate—Amu Gib—is currently in prison awaiting trial.
Prisoner number A1064FH is one of 17 candidates standing for the Islington Independents in the Finsbury Park ward of London. Gib, a 30-year-old former NHS patient transport driver and bike mechanic, is still recovering from the effects of a hunger strike. They have been held for almost ten months without trial at HMP Bronzefield in Surrey alongside four other Palestine Action activists.
Accused of breaking into an RAF air base and spray-painting two RAF Voyager planes, the so-called 'Brize Norton 5' are alleged to have caused £7 million worth of damage to aircraft that activists claim are used to support Israeli assaults on Gaza. Gib, who uses they/them pronouns, cannot access the internet in prison and has limited phone time, but communicated with this journalist via a network of friends and family.
Gib said they were inspired by independent councillor Gary Donnelly in Derry, Northern Ireland, whose model would make it “possible to represent and advocate for people despite being in prison, while also having a practical group of people who are able to do the things that I can’t.”
Gib told this reporter that their resolve had been “hardened” by imprisonment. “Not to romanticise it,” Gib said, “but I think it has deepened a sense of… the absurdity of just being able to be put in prison without a conviction.” They added: “You’re surrounded by people that the state has failed all the time—and you can see the people around you suffering the consequences of the cost-of-living crisis or the decision to put loads of money into weapons instead of healthcare and housing. So, I think it just hardens your resolve to do something about it.”
Gib recently ended a 48-day hunger strike demanding the end of Israel-based defence firm Elbit Systems’ operations in the UK. Hospitalised just before Christmas as their health rapidly deteriorated after losing over 10kg in weight, they said, “the prison guards bring the prison with them, so much so that you’re chained to them when you’re sleeping.”
Gib called their hunger strike “the battle of the empty intestines”, but said they are now recovering. “My conditions are not great. I’m restricted by how much I can move because I’m locked up in my cell 23 hours a day, but my body is otherwise recovering from the hunger strike.”
However, they said their co-defendant and fellow hunger-striker Umer Khalid, aged 22, has been in a serious condition after experiencing organ failure. “Umer has deteriorated and can now no longer walk,” Gib said. “I did feel really scared about the other hunger strikers, especially when I wasn’t on hunger strike myself anymore.”
Now, campaigners from writer Sally Rooney to activist Greta Thunberg have appealed to the judge to grant Gib bail at a hearing at the Old Bailey. “Amu’s continued detention is not only illogical and unjust, it is obstructing their ability to exercise their democratic rights,” they said in an open letter signed by thousands. “They should be on the streets of Finsbury Park, talking to voters.”
Prosecutors have justified the detention of the Brize Norton 5 beyond the normal legal limit of six months for pre-trial custody by alleging links to “terrorism”, as a result of the proscription of Palestine Action in July 2025. Alongside Gib and Khalid, Jon Cink, 25, Daniel Jeronymides-Norie, 36, and Lewie Chiaramello, 23, have all been charged under the National Security Act. Amnesty International UK says, “terrorism powers should never have been used to aggravate criminal charges against Palestine Action activists.”
Gib has pleaded not guilty to charges including conspiracy to destroy property and conspiracy to “enter a prohibited place for a purpose prejudicial to the safety and/or interests of the UK”. The latter charge carries a maximum jail term of 14 years. When asked what they missed most in prison, Gib said: “I’m missing being able to laugh with my loved ones in an un-surveilled environment. I’m dreaming of being able to walk to the top of a hill and run back down it, and swimming in clean rivers (solidarity with River Action and their legal case against Natural Resources Wales for polluting the River Wye). And, of course, dreaming of the day we Shut Elbit Down and close down all US-UK airbases.”
In one post on the Prisoners for Palestine website, Gib writes: “I’m afraid of hunger, of losing people, of having nothing to lose, of rivers running dry, of poisoned land, of forest fires, of the invention, manufacture, and release of bombs that can evaporate people and leave holes in the earth where they stood. I’m scared of our silence, and what its apparently possible to normalise. I’m scared of what we can stomach.”
For Gib, their experience since arrest has been one of painful ironies. “A bunch of masked men pulled us out of bed, made us put shoes on, and then walked us along a tow path for 15 minutes in darkness and total silence,” Gib said. “They told me to be careful not to trip on my laces. I was thinking how it was kind of ironic that I was now their responsibility, and it was up to them to make sure that I didn’t get hurt, not because they cared about me, but because they didn’t want the paperwork.” Now they say they “can only laugh” as they face the irony of being democratically elected while detained under terror laws slammed by campaigners as authoritarian.
The former Calais refugee volunteer grew up in Finsbury Park, attending local schools. “Amu will be a great councillor,” says Ilkay Cinko-Oner, Independent Councillor for Laycock Ward. “I know this because they will bring the same courage to fighting for the residents of Finsbury Park.”
In a message recorded from inside prison on their 30th birthday, Gib had one wish: “That every year of my life will act as a handful of sand in the gears of this imperialist killing machine. And that we live to see the day it eventually, inevitably, grinds to a halt. Free Palestine.” They quoted from Omar El Akkad’s book ‘Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This’: “There is no such thing as someone else’s children”.
A week from today, the residents of Finsbury Park ward will decide whether Amu Gib will become the first English politician to be elected from behind bars.
