The police arrested yesterday at his home in Glasgow, Peter Murrell, husband of the former Prime Minister of Scotland, Nicola Sturgeon, as part of Operation Branchform, a corruption investigation into the illegal funding of the National Party Scottish (SNP), which is at the head of the regional Government.
Officers are investigating the destination of more than £600,000 (€685,000), raised by Scottish independence activists in 2017, which did not appear in the formation’s accounts. In addition to the arrest, the police searched different addresses.
Without explaining the reasons, Sturgeon submitted her resignation as First Minister of Scotland and leader of the SNP on February 15, and was replaced on March 29 by the continuationist candidate Humza Yousaf, after an internal election. Yousaf referred to Murrell’s arrest as “a difficult day for the party” and called for calm from SNP militants. “The news this morning is challenging and difficult,” he said yesterday.
Murrell tendered his resignation as chief executive of the SNP in March after being accused of lying about the true number of SNP members during the open primary process to succeed Sturgeon.
In May 2021, the then national treasurer of the SNP, Douglas Chapman, resigned after less than a year in the post arguing that he “had not received the financial information necessary” to carry out his duties.
During his tenure, he increased support for the party among society, ended the dominance of the Labor Party in Scotland in 2007 and won an absolute majority in the Holyrood Parliament in 2011 for the first time.
In 2017 Sturgeon announced plans for a second independence referendum and launched an online crowdfunding campaign aiming to raise £1m (€1.14m).
Months later, with the defeat experienced by the SNP in the general elections, the campaign closed with 482,000 pounds (550,000 euros), with the promise that they would be used for the pro-independence cause.
However, in the 2020 income statement the reserves of the nationalist formation were 272,000 pounds (310,000 euros), a far cry from the collection of the previous campaign, which aroused the suspicions of the police.
