Rishi Sunak looked set to become Britain’s next prime minister after Boris Johnson withdrew from the contest. Boris Johnson withdrew saying that although he had enough support to make the final ballot he realized the country and the Conservative Party needed unity.
Boris Johnson had raced home from a holiday in the Caribbean to try and secure the backing of 100 lawmakers to enter Monday’s contest to replace Liz Truss, the woman who succeeded him in September after he was forced to quit over a string of scandals.
Also Read : Liz Truss Resigned as UK Prime Minister
He said he had secured the backing of 102 lawmakers and could have been “back in Downing Street”, but that he had failed to persuade either Rishi Sunak or the other contender Penny Mordaunt, to come together “in the national interest”.
“I believe I have much to offer but I am afraid that this is simply not the right time,” Johnson said late on Sunday.
The former prime minister had secured the public backing of just under 60 Conservative lawmakers by Sunday, well under half of the nearly 150 endorsements Sunak had received.
Johnson’s statement likely paves the way for his arch rival, the 42-year-old former finance minister Sunak, to become prime minister, possibly as soon as Monday. If confirmed, he would replace Liz Truss who was forced to resign after she launched an economic program that triggered turmoil in financial markets.
According to the rules, if only one candidate secures the backing of 100 Conservative lawmakers, they will be named prime minister on Monday.
If two candidates pass the threshold, they will go forward to a vote of the party membership, with the winner announced on Friday, just days before new finance minister Jeremy Hunt lays bare the state of the country’s finances in a budget plan due to be released on 31st Oct.
Regarding Rishi Sunak first came to national attention when, aged 39, he became finance minister under Johnson just as the COVID-19 pandemic arrived in Britain, developing a furlough scheme to support millions of people through multiple lockdowns.
“I served as your chancellor, helping to steer our economy through the toughest of times,” Sunak said in a statement on Sunday. “The challenges we face now are even greater. But the opportunities – if we make the right choice – are phenomenal.”
If chosen, Sunak would be the first prime minister of Indian origin in the United Kingdom.
His family migrated to Britain in the 1960s, a period when many people from Britain’s former colonies arrived to help rebuild the country after the Second World War.
After graduating from Oxford University, he later went to Stanford University where he met his wife Akshata Murthy, whose father is Indian billionaire N R Narayana Murthy, founder of outsourcing giant Infosys Ltd.
Remember here earlier Liz Truss Resigned as Uk Prime Minister after which Rishi will be more likely to become the new PM.
