THE co-ordinator of a volunteer army of tradesmen to refurbish Ibrox has stepped back from his involvement after becoming the latest high profile Rangers fan to be embroiled in a row over racist material.

 

Semi-retired painter and decorator Allan Woods admitted his social media profile page was blocked for a month by Facebook after a representative told him it was over a comment on his page advocating "ethnic cleansing".

Mr Woods says that he deactivated the account after he discovered he had been blocked. The account was used to launch the appeal for volunteers and update progress on the Rangers Pride fans group page.

The 62-year-old had amassed 200 tradesmen and 500 unskilled volunteers to help refurbish Ibrox and Murray Park and was expected to discuss it with the board.

His account, which was used to launch the appeal for volunteers on Rangers Pride has sparked a social media row after a litany of racist comments were discovered on his page.

The row developed hot on the heels of a club and police investigation into a sexually explicit cartoon of the prophet Mohammed allegedly tweeted by former Rangers director Chris Graham.

Mr Woods denies making the comments, which date back to October, 2012, said he is not racist and claimed his page may have been hacked.

The appeal and updates posted to the Facebook page of the Rangers Pride fans group have disappeared.

A Rangers Pride representative confirmed on the page that to "prevent all the hard work being undone" he has passed his list on "and I will do what is necessary to keep things moving."

One post dated October, 2014 said: "Everyone I know has had enough of Muslims and ethnic cleansing is fast becoming the only solution."

One of the earliest posts from October, 2012 said: "We even have ethnic scum infiltrating a discussion on ethnic scum."

According to the post, incendiary comments are made about paedophilia in Muslim countries.

Another post on the same day said: "In fact go one better and just round up all non cucaseans and sent the whole f****** lot back to their home countries and that includes Indians , Pakistanis, Romanians, Poles , Chines,, e [sic] japanese, Turks, Lithuanians, Saudis, Iraqis Iranis the whole lot.

"Get them all to f*** and maybe British citizens will be able to find a job."

"The way to beat the Islamic threat is by putting pressure on our MPs and demanding an end to immigration and to welfare payments to immigrants already in the UK," the post says.

Mr Woods denied holding the views that were on his account which he claimed he had not used since before 2012.

He told complainers on Twitter that the comments photograbbed from his Facebook account were "photoshopped". He added: "Telephonist for a fans group. Who cares?"

He told the Herald he did not understand how the account could have been used to launch the campaign.

He said: "I am not racist.

"I have Muslim friends and workmates. I don't know who hacked my account.

"I am a little bit behind on Facebook. I am not sure how it works."

Mr Woods' Twitter account from which he articulated his confusion over the row, contained further offensive material from February 27, when commenting on Edinburgh Castle turning green for St Patrick's Day.

It said: "Have you ever heard such cr**. This is Scotland not Ireland? St Patrick Day nothing to do with us."

It is understood the material on Mr Woods' Facebook page has been brought to the attention of the police. Police Scotland were unable to confirm whether they were investigating.