The Apprentice race row continues as Lord Sugar fires FIFTH non-white candidate

THE Apprentice race row is rumbling on after Lord Alan Sugar fired the FIFTH non-white candidate in last night's show.

Iasha Masood was the latest casualty of the boardroom, with Riyonn Farsad so far the only white contestant to get the boot.

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Shahin Hassan, Kenna Ngoma, Souleyman Bah and Lubna Farhan are the other BAME [black and minority ethnic] hopefuls to have already been fired by Sugar.

Fans were particularly outraged by Iasha's firing as earlier in the series she made Lord Sugar over £1 million when she was project manager on a task.

Furious viewers took to Twitter to point out the running theme, accusing the BBC One programme of racism.

One wrote: "The Apprentice doesn't even try to hide the fact that it’s a racist show, getting rid of all the POC week by week.

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"And Iasha did a lot more than some of these other candidates."

Another added: "The Apprentice straight up showed how racist the set up is this season."

A third seethed: "Lord Sugar is a racist absolutely no denying it think about who’s been fired."

A spokesperson for the show previously denied the allegations, insisting that it is the candidates' performance that determines who gets fired.

They told us at the time: "Which candidates return to the boardroom at the end of a task - and are therefore in the firing line - is determined by being on the losing team, and the project manager of that task deciding to take them back into the boardroom.

"The candidate's performance both on the task and in the boardroom are then key to Lord Sugar’s decision."

This is not the first racism scandal that this year's series of The Apprentice has faced, with TV bosses forced to launch an investigation into candidate Lottie Lion after she was accused of being racist in the group WhatsApp chat.

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The 19-year-old librarian allegedly told 33-year-old Lubna "shut up Gandhi" and "I'll f*** you up".

Now at least two contestants on the hit show are believed to have lodged complaints about Lottie's behaviour.

They claim that racism, bullying and homophobia were hushed up during filming, with one contestant complaining directly to the BBC and considering legal action.

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Alongside the WhatsApp messages, it's claimed she also said that the area of Somerset she is from has a low crime rate "because not many black people live there".

She is also said to have regularly referred to Ryan-Mark Parsons, 19, as "the short gay one" and Riyonn Farsad, 30, as "the tall gay one".

Lottie is also accused of making derogatory comments about trans women, saying they would not be allowed into the "ladies club" she belongs to.

It's also claimed she told fellow contestants she had never spoken to black person before going on the show.