The jokes have been flying fast and furious. Could an Indian-origin Briton actually make it to become the UK’s prime minister? The successor to arch-imperialists like Winston Churchill who left behind a ₹13 debt at the Bangalore Club and was taken prisoner by the Boers in South Africa? Will 10 Downing Street have a string of mango leaves over the door as a very Indian symbol of good luck?
The sceptics, who included most political commentators, thought Rishi Sunak, Britain’s ex–chancellor of the exchequer, would crash to earth at some point in the battle to be Britain’s prime minister. But he’s still far out in front and certain to be one of the two finalists in the race. The other finalist has to be a woman because there are no white males left on the political battlefield. The last one, Tom Tugendhat, was wiped off the slate late Monday.
In fact, the contest has become a symbol of how much Britain has changed in recent decades. Out of 10 original contenders, three candidates were of South Asian origin — Sunak, former health secretary Sajid Javid and attorney-general Suella Braverman.
Then, there was Kurdish-origin Nadhim Zahawi, who arrived as an 11-year-old in Britain not knowing any English. Nigerian-origin woman Kemi Badenoch ran a strong race but was knocked out Tuesday. She had almost no experience but talked up a storm. There was also Home Secretary Priti Patel who looked likely to run but held back at the last minute. Another potential candidate, first-time MP Bangladeshi-origin Rehman Chisti, had to withdraw because he had no backers.
“Rishi Sunak is the establishment candidate,” says columnist and former Daily Telegraph editor, Charles Moore, calling it: “an unprecedented position for a 42-year-old person of Indian origin, with three years’ experience of cabinet.”
Moore is right when he calls Sunak the “establishment candidate.” Sunak took over former Conservative leader William Hague’s seat in Richmond, Yorkshire, a place where non-white faces are not always welcome. (Fewer than 3 per cent of Sunak’s constituents are non-white).
Winning over the Yorkshire folk
Writing in Tuesday’s The Times, Hague threw his weight behind Sunak, saying: “The stand-out candidate is Rishi Sunak.” Hague then went on to describe what the dour Yorkshire folk had been seeking in the candidate to replace him. “A farmer would be good, or a military man. Obviously, they have to come from Yorkshire, that’s a given.” Sunak, though, who was from Southampton much further south and definitely had no Yorkshire roots, won them over.
Adds Hague: “At the election that followed, local independents and (the right-wing) Ukip fancied their chances against this newcomer. But they were all routed by Sunak, who turned out to be a highly energetic, bright, emotionally intelligent candidate.”
Others backing Sunak include Deputy Prime Minister Dominic Raab who also took to The Times pages to pitch for his ex-colleague. Raab says after the pandemic struck, “In a matter of days, Rishi designed and implemented the furlough scheme, which supported and saved 11.6 million jobs and ensured the sharpest recession for 300 years saw the smallest rise in unemployment of any recession in living memory.”
And it isn’t only Sunak and other non-whites who are making history. Sunak, whose resignation as chancellor was the final nail in the coffin of scandal-ridden Boris Johnson, is the man to beat. Till Tuesday he was facing three women — though Badenoch has now been knocked out. The two left in the race, Penny Mordaunt and Liz Truss, are both favourites of the Conservative Party’s strong right-wing. But if Badenoch had not been eliminated it would have presented a truly historic moment for Britain: An Asian male pitted against a Nigerian-origin woman for the country’s top job? That would have been an intriguing contest.
After his successful Covid-19 innings, Sunak was looking like political toast a few months ago after it was revealed his billionaire wife, Akshata Murthy, used a legal loophole to save millions of tax pounds on overseas dividends. Sunak seemed unable to talk his way out of trouble when faced by hostile interviewers. He even moved out of 11 Downing Street, the chancellor’s prestigious home next door to the prime minister’s dwelling-cum-office. Political commentators began speculating Sunak had one foot out of the door and soon would return to his old world of high finance and venture capital.
Sunak and other non-whites who’ve risen in the Conservative ranks should probably thank ex-prime minister David Cameron for enabling them to reach where they are today. Cameron says he found himself surrounded at cabinet meetings almost entirely by white males. He decided this had to change and fast-tracked women and minority politicians into safe Tory seats.
Amazingly, the non-whites who have climbed the party rungs are probably much further to the right than Cameron would have anticipated or even desired. Sunak was a staunch Brexiteer, even before it was embraced as Conservative policy. He’s a votary of free ports, believing they’ll help revive Britain’s economy, a doubtful proposition.
Others like Patel and Badenoch are also strongly right-wing. Even Javid, a bus driver’s son, was a party right-winter. Says leading British actor Adil Ray, better known to comedy fans as Citizen Khan: “I still cannot get my head around the fact that ALL the ethnic minority candidates vying to be PM support sending (UK) refugees to Rwanda. Not one, but all.”
Sunak’s rise clearly points to another fact. It might be time to ditch the old view of Britain as the country of Enoch Powell and his images of “rivers of blood”. It’s true racism was rampant in the 1970s as the number of Asians coming, especially from Idi Amin’s Uganda, soared. In the 1980s, too, the situation wasn’t much better.
Lord (Tarsem) King of West Bromwich, the first Sikh in the House of Lords, once described to me how he would be interrupted by jeering racists when he spoke as a West Midlands councillor. That behaviour eased off in the 1990s.
The world has come a long way in the last two decades. The Portuguese Prime Minister Antonio Costa is of Goan origin. And Leo Varadkar, who has an Indian-origin father, was prime minister or Taoiseach of a reputedly conservative country like Ireland. He’s now the deputy prime minister.
For now, it’s impossible to tell whether Sunak will be able to garner enough support amongst the Conservative Party members outside Westminster who get to pick from the two finalists. But the fact that he has even come this far is quite extraordinary.