Sorry for the miss last Thursday.
After the events in the UK elections right after my last post, I had to produce a follow-up, so here you have it. In a certain way, the quick election of Rishi Sunak after Liz Truss’ resignation, can be viewed as a ‘coup d’état’ by the Members of Parliement (MPs) of the Conservative party! «Why is that» you say? Keep reading.
Generally speaking, the leader replacement process in the Conservative party is based on the following procedure: People declare their candidacy, with support from a number of MPs, then there are rounds of voting by Conservative MPs until there are 2 candidates left. Then, the MPs vote, and there is a second vote by all registered Conservative party members. More or less like the primaries in the US.
Now during the Summer show between Truss and Sunak, we read everywhere that Truss is leading Sunak which was the end outcome in early September. Hell broke loose then under the guise of a mini-budget catastrophe with the party’s tenors fanning the fire. Liz Truss changed her finance minister, and the new person, Jeremy Hunt, did a u-turn in a fashion that was not complimentary to her. Meanwhile the Pound nosedived, Liz Truss resigned, Rishi declared candidacy quickly, as well as Penny Mordaunt. Boris Johnson (oh good old Boris is never too far) mulled the idea of candidacy, but in the end Boris and Penny withdrew, and Rishi won by default!!
You wonder where do I then get the idea of a ‘coup d’état’? You have a point, because what I described sounds like a normal turn of events; Except .......
You see when the voting for Liz Truss ad Rishi Sunak took place during the Summer period, Rishi got the upper hand among the Conservative MPs, but he lost the ‘popular vote’ among the registered Conservative party members. So the Conservative ‘Politburo’ of some sort wanted Sunak, but the ‘People’ chose Truss.
Right from the beginning of her term, the tenors and the MPs created issues, problems and un satisfaction with her, leading to her resignation. During the new turn, since the second ‘real candidate’ (Penny Mordaunt) withdrew, and Boris did not get in, there were no more elections. So the tenors’ and MPs’ will supplanted the people’s choice, thus my claim about a ‘coup d’état’!
Now to close, I mention another observation: Historically, UK Prime Ministers have come from Oxford, at least since Tony Blair, exception being Gordon Brown who studied at Edinburgh University, a fine, prestigious and elitist school. This is also the case of Rishi Sunak, but not Penny Mordaunt, whose Alma Matter was only University of Reading!
Paris, October 31, 2022
Zeejay