The British Kebab Awards (colloquially known as the 'kebabbies') are an annual event to celebrate local kebab restaurants across the UK. The awards were founded by Ibrahim Dogus, an entrepreneur, restaurateur and founder of the Centre for Turkey Studies (CEFTUS), in 2013.
Since their creation, the awards have attracted politicians from different political parties to network and present awards, [1] including Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and Sadiq Khan MP in 2016. [2] [3] [4] The awards are sponsored by internet fast food delivery provider Just Eat, and have attracted significant attention in both traditional and social media, being dubbed the KeBAFTAs by fans on Twitter. [5]
Founder Ibrahim Dogus is a former waiter, owner of Troia restaurant in Waterloo, London, and the son of Kurdish refugees from Turkey who arrived in the UK in 1994. Dogus became a community activist in the early 2000s, and was shot while trying to combat drug crime in Hackney, where he lived. [6]
The British Kebab Awards are organised by Dogus' thinktank, CEFTUS, whose aim is to 'build bridges between Turkey and the UK, and between Turkish, Kurdish and Cypriot communities.' [7] The 2017 awards were held at London's Westminster Park Plaza Hotel in February 2017. [8]
In 2016, Dogus announced a business venture to create the first beer made for drinking with kebabs, Bira London. [9] Dogus stated in the programme to the 2017 British Kebab Awards that he believes that the uncertainty caused by Brexit will create economic problems for small businesses. [10] In comments at the 2017 awards, Dogus paid tribute to "the places around the world which many of us feel an affinity with (that) have been struck by violence". [11]
The 2019 awards were held on March 18 in London. [12] Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn attended the 2019 awards, giving a speech in which he said that he liked kebab shops, despite being a vegetarian. "I love having a falafal wrap in a kebab shop", he revealed. [13] Other political guests included Conservative mayoral candidate Shaun Bailey, Angela Rayner, Bob Seely and Mark Francois. [14] The Mirror noted that the awards ceremony has "become a popular event on the Westminster calendar". [15]
Jeremy Bernard Corbyn is a British politician who has been Member of Parliament (MP) for Islington North since 1983. An independent, Corbyn was a member of the Labour Party from 1965 until his expulsion in 2024, and is a member of the Socialist Campaign Group parliamentary caucus. He served as Leader of the Opposition and Leader of the Labour Party from 2015 to 2020. Corbyn identifies ideologically as a socialist on the political left.
Michael John Gapes is a British former politician who served as Member of Parliament (MP) for Ilford South from 1992 to 2019.
Piers Richard Corbyn is a British weather forecaster, anti-vaccine activist, conspiracy theorist, and former politician. Corbyn was born in Wiltshire and raised in Shropshire wherein he attended Adams' Grammar School. He was awarded a first class BSc degree in physics from Imperial College London in 1968 and a postgraduate MSc in astrophysics from Queen Mary College, University of London, in 1981. Corbyn was a member of the Labour Party and served as a councillor in the London Borough of Southwark from 1986 to 1990. He is the elder brother of former Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn, leaving Labour in 2003 due to his opposition to the Iraq War.
Owen Smith is a British lobbyist and former Labour Party politician. Smith was Member of Parliament (MP) for Pontypridd from 2010 to 2019.
The 2016 United Kingdom European Union membership referendum, commonly referred to as the EU referendum or the Brexit referendum, was a non-binding referendum that took place on 23 June 2016 in the United Kingdom (UK) and Gibraltar to ask the electorate whether the country should remain a member of, or leave, the European Union (EU).
The 2017 United Kingdom general election was held on Thursday 8 June 2017, two years after the previous general election in 2015; it was the first since 1992 to be held on a day that did not coincide with any local elections. The governing Conservative Party led by the prime minister Theresa May remained the largest single party in the House of Commons but lost its small overall majority, resulting in the formation of a Conservative minority government with a confidence and supply agreement with the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) of Northern Ireland.
The Labour Party in Northern Ireland is the UK Labour Party's regional constituency organisation that operates in Northern Ireland. The Labour Party is not a registered political party in Northern Ireland and does not currently contest elections.
The 2019 United Kingdom general election was held on Thursday, 12 December 2019, with 47,567,752 registered voters entitled to vote to elect 650 Members of Parliament (MPs) to the House of Commons. The governing Conservative Party led by the prime minister, Boris Johnson, won a landslide victory with a majority of 80 seats, a net gain of 48, on 43.6 per cent of the popular vote, the highest percentage for any party since the 1979 general election, though with a narrower popular vote margin than that achieved by the Labour Party over the Conservatives at the 1997 general election. This was the second national election to be held in 2019 in the United Kingdom, the first being the 2019 European Parliament election.
This article summarises the views and voting record of Jeremy Corbyn, who was the Leader of the Opposition and Leader of the Labour Party in the United Kingdom from 12 September 2015 until 4 April 2020. An independent, Corbyn was a member of the Labour Party from 1965 until his expulsion in 2024.
A number of politicians, public figures, newspapers and magazines, businesses and other organisations endorsed either the United Kingdom remaining in the EU or the United Kingdom leaving the EU during the 2016 United Kingdom European Union membership referendum.
After the British EU membership referendum held on 23 June 2016, in which a majority voted to leave the European Union, the United Kingdom experienced political and economic upsets, with spillover effects across the rest of the European Union and the wider world. Prime Minister David Cameron, who had campaigned for Remain, announced his resignation on 24 June, triggering a Conservative leadership election, won by Home Secretary Theresa May. Following Leader of the Opposition Jeremy Corbyn's loss of a motion of no confidence among the Parliamentary Labour Party, he also faced a leadership challenge, which he won. Nigel Farage stepped down from leadership of the pro-Leave party UKIP in July. After the elected party leader resigned, Farage then became the party's interim leader on 5 October until Paul Nuttall was elected leader on 28 November.
Theresa May's tenure as prime minister of the United Kingdom began on 13 July 2016 when she accepted an invitation from Queen Elizabeth II to form a government after the resignation of her predecessor David Cameron in the aftermath of the European Union (EU) membership referendum, and ended upon her resignation on 24 July 2019. May's premiership was dominated by Brexit, terrorist attacks in Westminster, the Manchester Arena and London Bridge, the Grenfell Tower fire, and the Salisbury poisonings. As prime minister, May served simultaneously as First Lord of the Treasury, Minister for the Civil Service and Leader of the Conservative Party.
Franco Manca is a sourdough Neapolitan pizza business operating around 70 pizzerias in the UK. It was founded in 2008 by Giuseppe Mascoli and Bridget Hugo. The first restaurant opened on Market Row in Brixton Market. Initially sites were in the London metropolitan area, then the company opened in Italy with a summer pizzeria on the island of Salina to the north of Sicily. Since then the company has opened restaurants in many English cities; Brighton, Bath, Bristol, Cambridge, Leeds, Manchester and Oxford. These were followed by Glasgow and Edinburgh in Scotland and in the centre of the Welsh capital Cardiff. Franco Manca opened a pizzeria in Malaga Spain in April 2023. Franco Manca was named the UK's best Italian Restaurant on Yelp. Franco Manca's menu consists of pizza with various meat and vegetarian options. It uses a traditional Neapolitan soft base.
The Centre for Turkey Studies (CEFTUS) is a UK-based thinktank which organises discussion events on issues relating to Turkey. CEFTUS, established in 2011 and run by Ibrahim Dogus, also organises events promoting the Turkish, Kurdish and Cypriot communities in the UK, including the Turkish, Kurdish, Cypriot Community Achievement Awards and the British Kebab Awards.
Ibrahim Dogus is an entrepreneur and restaurateur. He is founder of SME4Labour. He is also founder of the Centre for Turkey Studies and Centre for Kurdish Progress, and an active organiser for the Turkish and Kurdish community in London and the UK. He is also a British Labour Party politician, serving as a Lambeth Borough councillor. Dogus was the parliamentary candidate for the Labour Party for the Cities of London and Westminster constituency in the June 2017 UK general election and for West Bromwich East at the 2019 general election.
The Centre for Kurdish Progress is a platform for discussing issues affecting Kurdish-speakers in the UK and Kurdish regions in the Middle East. It was founded in 2014 by Ibrahim Dogus, who has also founded the Centre for Turkey Studies think tank. The Centre for Kurdish Progress holds regular discussion events, some of which are held within the UK Parliament buildings. The centre also organises an annual celebration of the Kurdish New Year, Newroz, in conjunction with the Most Successful Kurds in Britain Awards ceremony.
The second May ministry was formed on 11 June 2017 after Theresa May returned to office following the June 2017 snap general election. The election resulted in a hung parliament with the Conservative Party losing its governing majority in the House of Commons. On 9 June 2017, May announced her intention to form a Conservative minority government, reliant on the confidence and supply of the Democratic Unionist Party; a finalised agreement between the two parties was signed and published on 26 June 2017.
Our Future Our Choice (OFOC) was a British pro-European Union advocacy group for young people.
A referendum on the Brexit withdrawal agreement, also referred to as a "second referendum", a "rerun", a "people's vote", or a "confirmatory public vote", was proposed by a number of politicians and pressure groups as a way to break the deadlock during the 2017–19 Parliament surrounding the meaningful vote on the Brexit deal.
German Doner Kebab (GDK) is a fast casual kebab chain, specialising in German doner kebabs, owned by Hero Brands since 2017. Tracing its heritage to a restaurant in Berlin, Germany in 1989, the first site opened in Dubai, United Arab Emirates in 2013, the company was purchased with a majority share in 2017 by the Sarwar family and moved its headquarters to Glasgow, Scotland.