LONDON: Brexit campaigner Nigel Farage will meet the European Union’s chief negotiator on Monday in what he said was an attempt to convey the views of 17.4 million Britons who voted to leave the bloc.
Farage, who as UKIP leader convinced Prime Minister Theresa May’s predecessor, David Cameron, to call the Brexit referendum and then helped lead the campaign for Brexit, has repeatedly scolded May for being too weak in the EU divorce talks.
He said in a video clip posted on Twitter that he would meet the EU’s chief Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier on Monday and appealed for people to send him their questions to put to Barnier.
“I thought who is in there representing the views of the 17.4 million people? Nobody,” Farage said. “Well I’ve finally got my meeting with Mr.Barnier. Its going to happen.”
In the United Kingdom’s 2016 referendum, 51.9 percent, or 17.4 million people, voted to leave the EU while 48.1 percent, or 16.1 million people, voted to stay.
May has said Britain will leave the EU on March 29 at 2300GMT. The EU and Britain are discussing the terms of the divorce.
Farage, 53, casts the EU as a doomed experiment in German-dominated unity and excessive debt-funded welfare spending.
He has dismissed speculation from opponents of Brexit such as former British Prime Minister Tony Blair that voters might change their mind about leaving the EU.
“The revolution of 2016 is still rolling,” he told Reuters in November. “The European Union project is in deep trouble and it’s only a matter of time until it ends.”
Brexiteer Nigel Farage enters the lion’s den to meet EU’s chief negotiator
Brexiteer Nigel Farage enters the lion’s den to meet EU’s chief negotiator
