Farai Mabeza
A tiny English village has voted overwhelmingly to “declare independence” from the United Kingdom in a symbolic referendum sparked by government plans to house more than 1,200 asylum seekers at a nearby former military site.
Residents of Piddington, an Oxfordshire village of about 350 people, went to the polls on Tuesday, with 285 voting in favour of seeking independence from the UK. Twenty-six voted against, while one ballot was spoiled. Turnout was about 92 per cent.
The vote has no legal force and does not mean that Piddington has actually left Britain. It was organised by the local parish council as a protest against plans to accommodate 1,256 single adult male asylum seekers at a former Ministry of Defence facility near the village.
The British government has not publicly specified the nationalities of the asylum seekers who would be housed at the former Bicester military site.
Residents argue that the proposed number of asylum seekers is disproportionate to the size of their community and say they have not been adequately consulted. Some have also raised concerns about infrastructure, security and the potential effect on everyday life in the village.
Parish council chairman Tim McNally described the referendum as a way for residents to make themselves heard.
The government, however, says the use of former military sites forms part of efforts to reduce reliance on costly asylum hotels and deal with the country\'s asylum accommodation backlog.
The unusual protest has drawn international attention partly because of its language. Residents were asked whether they supported Piddington “seeking to secede from the United Kingdom and pursuing self-determination”.
For a village with no pub, shop or café, the idea of becoming a new state may sound fanciful. But the vote has given Piddington a way to put a very local dispute into the language of national independence — echoing, in miniature, the much more consequential independence movements that have reshaped countries around the world.
