They Let the Pakistani Rape Gangs Walk Free

Ten years late and still no convictions. This is what the police in a rape gang town tried to hide

Five more arrests. Five men in their forties and fifties, dragged from their beds on Tuesday morning in Oldham, suspected of raping children. The police press release arrives with all the usual fanfare: "Officers working tirelessly." "Robust cases being built." "Specialist support for survivors."

What they won't say in their sanitised statements is that these arrests happened because two survivors found the courage to speak again. Not because GMP suddenly grew a conscience. Not because Andy Burnham discovered moral leadership. Because girls who were failed a decade ago refused to stay silent.

Twenty-one arrests under Operation Sherwood now. Twenty-one men who walked free for years while their victims grew up carrying scars that will never heal. And still - still - not a single charge. Not one conviction. Just press releases and promises from the same institutions that looked the other way when it mattered.

The Girls They Threw Away

Oldham between 2011 and 2014 wasn't the sanitised version you'll read in council reports. Working-class girls, some barely teenagers, were being groomed, raped, and passed around like commodities while the adults paid to protect them found excuses to look elsewhere.

These weren't invisible crimes happening in shadows. Girls were reporting abuse. Evidence existed. Police witnessed girls being dragged off the streets, teachers rescued 12 year olds from rape dens, parents pleaded with those in power. Instead of safeguarding, what did we get? Disbelief. Victim-blaming. Files that mysteriously went missing. Investigations that quietly died. Girls branded as "trouble" while their rapists walked free to find fresh victims.

And while this hell was unfolding, what were our institutions doing? Oldham Council was managing its reputation. GMP was protecting its clear-up rates. Politicians were calculating votes. Everyone had priorities except the only one that mattered - protecting children.

The National Scandal They Can't Hide From

Don't let anyone tell you Oldham was an isolated case. This was the blueprint, rolled out across the country while decent people were silenced and smeared for raising concerns.

In Rotherham, at least 1,400 children were sacrificed while officials worried about "community relations." In Rochdale, GMP's own Operation Span exposed years of contemptible failure, with senior officers later admitting they'd written off victims as "not credible." Girls were dying while police counted statistics.

Manchester's Operation Augusta found evidence of industrial-scale grooming connected to 15-year-old Victoria Agoglia's death in 2003. Did they follow the evidence? Did they save other girls? No. They shelved it in 2005 and walked away. When the truth finally emerged years later, the Independent Office for Police Conduct confirmed GMP had failed vulnerable children and then refused to hold a single officer accountable.

This is the same GMP now claiming they're "working tirelessly" in Oldham. The same force that had a decade to act and chose denial instead.

The Survivors Who Wouldn't Be Broken

If you believe GMP's press releases, Operation Sherwood sprang from their dedication to justice. The truth is uglier and more inspiring. It exists because a handful of survivors and campaigners refused to let this story die.

They wrote. They protested. They published evidence of cover-ups. They confronted councillors who'd spent years telling residents it was all 'bare faced lies'. They forced truth into daylight while institutions scrambled to maintain their lies.

When Andy Burnham commissioned the Oldham Assurance Review in 2019, it was damage control disguised as accountability. But even that whitewash couldn't hide the scale of institutional failure. Published in 2022, it admitted what campaigners had been saying for years. Children were betrayed, files were ignored, girls were abandoned to predators. Yet even then, Burnham claimed there was no cover up. Do you believe that?

Operation Sherwood didn't launch because GMP found its conscience. It launched because denial had collapsed under the weight of evidence we forced into the open.

Empty Promises, Hollow Progress

Twenty-one arrests. Zero charges. Zero convictions.

Read that again. Every press release, every promise of "robust investigations," every assurance that "survivors are at the heart of everything we do" - and still not one rapist facing justice in court.

For survivors, this isn't a statistic. It's another cycle of hope crushed by reality. Another reminder that institutions which failed them once are failing them again. Every arrest announcement raises expectations. Every failure to bring charges destroys a little more faith.

This pattern is replicated across the country. In Rotherham, South Yorkshire Police promised reform after the Jay Report, but convictions remain a fraction of known abuse. In Telford, years of reports yielded headlines but little justice. The script never changes. Scandal breaks, investigations are promised, press releases are issued, nothing happens.

Words without justice. Hope without accountability. PR without prosecutions.

The Question They Won't Answer

Here's what GMP doesn't want you to understand. If they can arrest these men now, they could have arrested them ten years ago. The passage of time hasn't unlocked magical new investigative powers. What's changed is this - survivors kept speaking, campaigners kept fighting, and denial became impossible to maintain.

So why didn't they act when it mattered? Why did they allow girls to be destroyed while evidence sat in files? Why were communities gaslit while predators operated with impunity?

The answer is institutional cowardice. It was easier to dismiss victims than confront uncomfortable truths. Simpler to blame "troubled girls" than investigate organised abuse. Safer to protect reputations than children.

Andy Burnham rejected calls for an independent inquiry into Greater Manchester's handling of grooming gangs, preferring internal reviews that asked safe questions and reached comfortable conclusions. The IOPC's refusal to prosecute officers after Operation Augusta sent a message. Fail children, face no consequences.

Without accountability, failure becomes the system. Survivors are retraumatised, communities lose faith, perpetrators remain free.

A Town Still Betrayed

Oldham deserves better than this charade. For over a decade, this community has endured official denials, political cowardice, and institutional gaslighting. Families who raised concerns were branded racists. Survivors were silenced and isolated.

Now GMP claims to be rebuilding trust with every press release. But trust isn't rebuilt with words. Trust can only be earned with convictions. Justice isn't delivered in statements. Justice is served in courtrooms.

The girls of Oldham were thrown away once by institutions that should have protected them. They won't be thrown away again by accepting empty promises as progress.

The Reckoning That's Overdue

Operation Sherwood exists today because survivors refused to disappear and campaigners refused to surrender. Without them, Oldham's shame would still be buried in council filing cabinets and police archives.

But survival isn't justice. Arrests aren't accountability. Press releases aren't progress.

These latest arrests prove what was always possible. They also expose what was always inexcusable. GMP could have acted a decade ago but chose not to. Children were sacrificed for institutional comfort.

Unless Operation Sherwood delivers convictions, it will stand as another monument to false hope. Another betrayal of survivors who deserved protection, not press releases.

The girls of Oldham were worth saving then. Their voices are worth hearing now. Their justice is worth fighting for. And when it comes to the rape gangs, justice is long overdue.

I am Raja Miah. It is now seven years since I first started to expose how politicians protected the rape gangs.

Labour Party leaders tried everything to stop me from exposing what took place. They fabricated evidence and used Gtr Manchester Police and the CPS to try and maliciously prosecute me. I spent over three years on bail as case after case collapsed in court. My mother died before I could clear my name.

The truth is now undeniable: the Pakistani rape gangs are real, their victims number in the hundreds of thousands, and the cover-up continues.

The National Inquiry we fought for is about to begin. This is our one chance to ensure it isn't another whitewash. But only if enough people know what really happened and are prepared to fight back against the next attempt at a cover up.

Despite a mainstream media blackout of my work, Red Wall and the Rabble has grown to over 6,000 subscribers. Help me reach 10,000 before the inquiry begins.

Every new subscriber makes it harder for them to bury this story. Every share makes it more difficult to dismiss the evidence. Every voice raised makes justice more likely.

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This is the fight. This is the moment. There will not be another.

- Raja Miah MBE