Boris came banging the voting drum, vanishes in a bubble as Bojo-mania loses fizz:
Royal appointment... New Prime Minister Rishi Sunak met King Charles III on Tuesday at Buckingham Palace in London, where the monarch asked him to form a Government in his name.
MULTI-MILLIONAIRE RISHI SUNAK AT LAST MAKES IT TO 10 DOWNING STREET AS THIRD BRITISH PRIME MINISTER IN A YEAR
By SHAMLAL PURI
Associate Publisher & Senior Editor – UK
shamlalpuri4@gmail.com
Worth Noting:
- Sunak’s victory was greeted with euphoria by most MPs when he went to the Conservative Party headquarters in Central London. He gave an 86-second speech in which he looked. He promised to renew stability and unity in the Party after weeks of in-fighting, which one opposition leader described as “fighting like rats.”
- Sunak got to work straightway away. On Tuesday, he went for the traditional audience with the monarch – King Charles III – who invited Rishi to form his government.
- It’s worth noting that Rishi Sunak, who has £730 million wealth, is even richer than King Charles III. The King’s wealth was around £382 million (US$440 million) before inheritance was mainly tied up in real estate.
On Monday, the United Kingdom finally got its Barack Obama moment when multi-millionaire Rishi Sunak made history by being the first British Asian diasporan to break race and colour barriers to be the Prime Minister.
Hours later, he ran into a storm of protests over his controversial appointment of Cabinet members. During his first Prime Minister’s Question time session on Wednesday afternoon, he was grilled and accused by the opposition of being a “weak” prime minister.
Persistent pays – after failing for the first time on 5 September, Sunak finally won a ‘landslide’ victory of 193 votes from the 357 member-ruling Tory party when the sole contestant, the House of Commons leader Penny Mordaunt, who polled a poor 26 votes, was forced to pull out due to lack of support.
She claimed to have 90 supporters but could not prove the figure.
Another contestant Boris Johnson, the former Prime Minister whose forced resignation in July sparked off the race for his replacement, challenged the two candidates to return to Downing Street. His bid flopped. It failed to get the support of his party members, with just 58 who had publicly declared their support, but he made unproven claims of 102 MPs backing him.
Penny Mordaunt, who continuously fobbed off approaches for support from Boris, unconvincingly sought to stand on her own steam as the Prime Minister officially received 26 MPs’ support. However, there were unproved claims from her camp that she had 90. Each candidate needed 100.
Boris and Mordaunt pulled out from the race, leaving the field wide open for Sunak, who, with 193 supporters from 357 MPs, was appointed Prime Minister unchallenged, and the online vote to select the winner from the three candidates was abandoned.
Sunak’s victory was greeted with euphoria by most MPs when he went to the Conservative Party headquarters in Central London. He gave an 86-second speech in which he looked. He promised to renew stability and unity in the Party after weeks of in-fighting, which one opposition leader described as “fighting like rats.”
Sunak got to work straightway away. On Tuesday, he went for the traditional audience with the monarch – King Charles III – who invited Rishi to form his government.
It’s worth noting that Rishi Sunak, who has £730 million wealth, is even richer than King Charles III. The King’s wealth was around £382 million (US$440 million) before inheritance was mainly tied up in real estate.
After his audience with King Charles, Prime Minister at Buckingham Palace Sunak and addressed the assembled media outside the front door of 10 Downing Street, where just an hour or so earlier, the outgoing Prime Minister Liz Truss bid her farewell and welcomed her successor saying there were better days ahead. She defiantly insisted she was on the right path to restore the economy despite the mess caused.
As he returned from Buckingham Palace, Sunak was jeered by Greenpeace protesters outside the iron gates of 10 Downing Street, demanding the government abandon their plans for fracking for shale gas. They were kept out of Dawning Street as a security measure.
At around 11.35 am on Tuesday, Prime Minister Sunak said he was humbled and honoured to get Tory MPs’ backing and be given the keys to 10 Downing Street.
“It is the greatest privilege of my life to be able to serve the party I love and to give back to the country I owe so much to.”
“The United Kingdom is a great country. But there is no doubt we face profound economic challenges. We need stability and unity, and I will prioritise bringing our Party and country together.”
He said unity and stability “is the only way to overcome the challenges we face and build a better, more prosperous future for our children and grandchildren.”
In all humility, he paid tribute to his predecessor Liz Truss. “She was not wrong to want to improve growth in this country. It is a noble aim. And I admired her restlessness in creating change. But some mistakes were made and not borne of ill will or bad intentions. Quite the opposite, in fact. But mistakes, nonetheless.
“And I have been elected as leader of my Party and your Prime Minister, in part, to fix them. And that work begins immediately. I will place economic stability and confidence at the heart of this government’s agenda. This will mean difficult decisions to come,” he warned.
He said his government would have integrity, professionalism, and accountability at every level.
Despite backstage battles between him and Boris during the leadership contest, Sunak did not forget to pay tribute to Johnson. “I will always be grateful to Boris Johnson for his incredible achievements as Prime Minister, and I treasure his warmth and generosity of spirit.”
“And I know he would agree that the mandate my Party earned in 2019 is not the sole property of any one individual. It is a mandate that belongs to the Party and unites all of us.”
He diplomatically put down Boris’s camp’s claims that the 2019 election belonged to Johnson and that he had the legitimacy to continue as Prime Minister until the 2024 election.
Though there was a lot of work to be done – to build a stronger NHS, better schools, safer streets, protecting the environment, supporting the UK’s armed forces, control the nation’s borders and the economic opportunities to be had from Brexit, Sunak said, “I will not be daunted.”
“I know the high office I have accepted, and I hope to live up to its demands.”
Sunak’s next task was finding the right people in his cabinet. That was choice which brought its criticisms and appreciation.
Sunak sacked Conservative Party chairman Jake Berry for criticising him earlier on the Prime Minister’s reported plans to divert funds from “deprived urban areas” towards wealthy towns.
Sunak denied this, but Berry went a step further to lambast Rishi saying, “He says one thing and does another – from putting up taxes to trying to block funding for our armed forces and now levelling up.”
During the Wednesday question time in the Commons, Sir Keir Starmer took a swipe against Sunak, quoting Berry’s criticism adding, he was not saying this, but the Try side was saying this.
Many of his ministers came from Liz Truss’s and Boris Johnson’s cabinets. There were no new faces, as Sunak did not want to take any chances by appointing untried hands. Cabinet appointments were more like musical chairs. It is a well-known fact that leaders often reward their prominent supporters with cabinet posts. This is what appears to have happened.
Sunak’s first significant appointment was Jeremy Hunt as the Chancellor of the Exchequer, an appointment made by Liz Truss after the sacking of Ghanaian diasporan Kwasi Kwarteng.
Former health secretary Therese Coffey, known for her aggressive views, was named Environment Secretary.
Suella Braverman’s appointment as Home Secretary touched a raw nerve with the critics because she was ‘sacked’ from Liz Truss’s cabinet for breaching security on confidential cabinet papers, which she sent through her private email rather than the official.
Sir Keir Starmer, opposition Labour accused Sunak of being a “weak” prime minister by making a “grubby” appointment. There are calls demanding a probe against Braverman for breaching the ministerial code.
Dominic Raab, Johnson’s Deputy Prime Minister, was given the same post with the additional responsibility of Justice secretary, a portfolio he had held in the Boris administration.
James Cleverly, also from the Truss administration, retained his portfolio of Foreign Secretary; Ben Wallace as Defence Secretary; Kemi Badenoch as International Trade Secretary and Minister for Women and Equalities.
Nadhim Zahawi, who first publicly supported his friend Boris, switched support to Sunak after Johnson withdrew his bid, is the Conservative Party chairman replacing Jake Berry.
Labour leader Starmer, who is demanding a general election now, charged during the Wednesday PMQ time in the Commons that Sunak had made a “grubby” appointment of the Home Secretary, showing how weak he is.
Penny Mordaunt, who gave last-minute support to Sunak, was reinstated as the leader of the House of Commons from the Truss administration. Some critics said she was unhappy and wanted something better.
Grant Shapps is the new Business Secretary, Michelle Donelan is the Culture Secretary, Mark Harper is Transport Secretary, and Steve Barclay is the Health Secretary.
Prominently missing from the appointments at present, is Sajid Javid, former Chancellor of the Exchequer and Health Secretary in the Boris administration,
One does not know if he had no interest in joining the cabinet, but his goodwill was evident when he tweeted a congratulatory message to Sunak.
“I’ve always believed that Britain is the most successful multiracial country on earth – this takes it to a new level. So proud of my friend Rishi Sunak on becoming the first British Asian UK Prime Minister. A historical moment.”
After Sunak’s tribute to Johnson, the former Prime Minister Boris, who had not congratulated Sunak, promptly responded with his awkward message of felicitations, more as a diplomatic nicety than expressing genuine feelings. He urged Conservative party members to extend their full support to Sunak.
Boris Johnson appears to harbour intentions to return to Downing Street. His followers say the Sunak Government would last no more than six months as plans are reportedly in the pipeline to oust him. It remains a matter of conjecture if these plans could succeed.
The opposition parties renewed their call for immediate general elections as more Britons signed the petition demanding polls.
Sir Keir Starmer lashed out at the Conservatives saying the Party has shown that it no longer has the mandate to govern.
“The Tories cannot respond to their latest shambles by yet again simply clicking their fingers and shuffling the people at the top without the consent of the British people,” he said.
“They do not have a mandate to put the country through another experiment; Britain is not their personal fiefdom to run as they wish.”
He said that after 12 years of Tory failure, the British people deserve so much better than this revolving door of chaos.
“In the last few years, the Tories have set record-high taxation, trashed our institutions and created a cost-of-living crisis. Now they have crashed the economy so badly that people face £500 a month extra on their mortgages. The damage they have done will take years to fix.”
He said each of these crises was made in Downing Street but paid for by the British public, adding each one has left the country weaker and worse off.
Sir Keir said the British public deserves a proper say on the country’s future. “They must have the chance to compare the Tories’ chaos with Labour’s plans to sort out their mess, gown the economy for working people and rebuild the country for a fairer, greener future. We must have a chance for a fresh start. We need a general election – now.”
In recent weeks, Labour is winning on popularity stakes. It is 37% more popular than the Tories.
As things now stand, Rishi Sunak will be the Prime Minister until 17 December 2024, when the next election is scheduled – unless he is ousted, or an earlier election is called.
Sunak has made history by breaking the race and colour barriers and making it to Downing Street, however longer or shorter his rule is.
From the diaspora point of view – there is a preposterous struggle to claim Rishi Sunak as one of their own. The claims come from India, Pakistan, Kenya, Tanzania, and the UK.
India has claimed Sunak as the first Indian and Hindu origin Prime Minister of the UK, a fact that has been exploited on religious grounds, which is currently the bitter flavour of Indian politics. Religious leaders urged diaspora Indians not to play the Hindu card.
Bored Indians enjoy hero worship and making Rishi one of their own adds to their self-satisfaction.
According to publicly available information, Rishi Sunak was born in 1980 in the southern England city of Southampton.
His mother, Usha, was born in the then Tanganyika (now Tanzania), and his father, Yashveer Sunak, was born in Kenya.
Yashveer arrived in Liverpool in 1966 and studied medicine at the University of Liverpool. He now lives in Southampton.
Indian? Not really. Rishi’s parents were born in East Africa.
Rishi’s paternal grandfather, Ramdas Sunak, used to live in Gujranwala, now in Pakistan. Forced by the deteriorating pre-1947 partition and independence days’ Hindu-Muslim relations he left Gujranwala in 1935 to work as a clerk in Nairobi, Kenya.
Ramdas’s wife, Suhag Rani Sunak, moved to Delhi from Gujranwala along with her mother-in-law before travelling to Kenya in 1937.
Ramdas was an accountant who later became an administrative officer with the colonial government in Kenya.
Ramdas and Suhag Rani had six children, three sons and three daughters. Rishi’s father, Yashveer Sunak, was born in 1949 in Nairobi.
All three daughters of Ramdas and Suhag Rani studied in India.
Rishi’s mother, Usha is the daughter of Raghubir and Sraksha Berry. She received a degree in pharmacology from Aston University in 1972.
Rishi’s parents, Usha and Yashveer, met in the UK and married in Leicester in 1977.
Rishi was born in 1980 in Southampton and attended the prestigious private school called Winchester College.
Rishi’s maternal grandfather, Raghubir Berry, grew up in Punjab and moved to Tanganyika as a railway engineer.
He married Tanganyika-born Sraksha, who moved to the UK in 1966 with a one-way ticket she bought after selling her wedding jewellery.
In the UK, Raghubir Berry worked for many years in the UK’s Inland Revenue department.
He became a Member of the Order of the British Empire or MBE – an award for significant contribution to society – in 1988.
India has laid claim to Rishi Sunak as the Hindu Prime Minister of the UK. Interestingly, despite his Punjab, India credentials, Rishi Sunak does not read or write the State language, Punjabi.
There have been Indian descent Prime Ministers in Europe before, so critics of India ask what is new about Rishi Sunak?
Leo Varadkar, the current PM of Ireland, is of Indian descent. India does not talk of him because his mother is Irish Catholic, and his father is a Maharashtrian. In 2003, he completed his internship at KEM Mumbai.
Antonio Costa, the current PM of Portugal, is of Indian descent, born to parents from Goa. But India does not recognise him.
Both men are in their second term as PMs. Unfortunately, they are Christian.
Many people do not understand this hype of Rishi Sunak; what makes him different from the other two leaders of Indian descent?
Pakistan lays claim on the Sunaks as Ramdas Sunak hailed from Gujranwala. Kenya says, not really; Rishi Sunak’s father was born in Kenya, and Tanzania says, oh yes, Usha Berry was born in Tanzania!
To cap it all, the UK asks what all this fuss is. Rishi Sunak was born in the UK!!
Many people wouldn’t bother, but the media has gone over the top, hyping the Sunaks’ Hindu card and Indian connections. Probably, the Indian fourth estate has nothing else positive to report from their countries except being in election mode throughout the year.
The Indian media is dull exploiting political bias and religious bigotry.
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