The UK Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, a diehard Eurosceptic, is facing the toughest test in his political career. He has been delivered a body blow by the spate of resignations of the senior ministers, following which he yielded to their demands and quit as the leader of the Conservative Party, which by default makes him lose the premiership.
However, giving the political situation a twist, he wants to cling on to the post of the Prime Minister till his party elects a new leader: a cumbersome process which may take around three months. The insistence has aggravated the resentment against Johnson in the party. Conservative Party leaders want his earliest departure from the 10 Downing Street.
Johnson announced his decision after a bitter stand-off with his Cabinet. In fact, during the same meeting, new Chancellor Nadhim Zahawi asked him to leave the Prime Minister office. Meanwhile, Labour leader Keir Starmer has said his party will initiate a vote of confidence if Johnson refuses to go early. Starmer said, “He needs to go: he can’t cling on in this way. His own party has now decided that he is unfit to be Prime Minister; they can’t now inflict him on the country for the next few months.”
It is a clear indication that Johnson now must understand his limits. And in case a no confidence vote is held in Parliament and the Conservatives lose, the party will get 14 days to elect a new leader and prove majority again. If the Conservative Party fails to do so, a fresh national election will be held. This, by no stretch of imagination, is a good proposition for the Conservative Party. There are only two possible ways for the party: either bear
with the long process of electing a new leader or replace Johnson with a care-taker Prime Minister.
Johnson came to power in July 2019. He is a rare leader who always prefers an argument of “no ifs, no buts”. He has remained as the cheerleader of Brexit, and he has finally made it when two earlier British Prime Ministers miserably failed. Both David Cameron and Theresa May had to quit the Prime Minister office primarily because of issues centered around the great Brexit debate. Brexit, which saw a nation intricately divided along fault lines, has made deep impact on the political discourse in the country.
Cameron opened the tinderbox and May got into it, but clever Johnson took the full benefit of the divided Britons to occupy the 10 Downing Street. However, while highlighting the Brexit conundrum, it would be misleading to brand Johnson as an isolationist. His sole concern was to bring forth a Great Britain out of the Brussel’s bureaucracy and establish a new British identity in global politics.
This week Johnson encountered a severe battering at Prime Minister’s Questions before a parliamentary committee of senior lawmakers in Parliament. Afterwards a delegation of Cabinet members arrived at the 10 Downing Street, the official residence of the British Prime Minister, asking him to step down. The bruising appearance of Johnson after facing the parliamentary committee was more than a pointer at his incapacity and uncomfortable times that he is wading through in public life.
This Wednesday night he fired close ally and senior Cabinet Minister Michael Gove, who had, as sources say, asked the Prime Minister to step down.
Another key ally and Home Secretary Priti Patel confided in Johnson that the general opinion of the Conservative Party was that he had to go. Amid all the high-profile resignations, his parliamentary private secretary James Doddridge said that Johnson is “fighting on because he believes he can win”. It seems that he may continue occupying the office to see who the next leader would be.
With his immediate resignation, a new debate comes up for selecting the next leader of the Conservative Party. The frontrunners for the Prime Minister’s post are recently resigned Treasury chief Rishi Sunak, his successor in that job Nadhim Zahawi, Foreign Secretary Liz Truss, Attorney General Suella Braverman and Defence Secretary Ben Wallace. For the first time it so happens that the UK, an imperial power that once occupied India for more than two hundred years, has seen two contenders for the top job from that part of the world only: Rishi Sunak and Suella Braverman.
By this time different suggestions are emerging from various quarters. One of the ideas is that Johnson should quit now and call for a caretaker government under current Deputy Prime Minister Dominic Raab or Theresa May, Johnson’s predecessor. Former British Prime Minister John Major said it would be unwise and unsustainable for Johnson to remain in the office for a length of time when a new leader is chosen.
Sir Graham Brady in a letter to the chairman of the 1922 Committee of the Conservative backbenchers wrote: “The proposal for the Prime Minister to remain in office for up to three months having lost the support of his Cabinet, his Government and the parliamentary party is unwise and may be unsustainable.”
Major suggested that Johnson could resign as Prime Minister and Raab could take over as acting Prime Minister till a new leader is elected. Another idea he gave was that the Conservative lawmakers could elect a new leader to be installed as Prime Minister and then the party members could later endorse his candidature. These are all probable constitutional routes available for now. It’s Johnson who should immediately decide the future course of action in no time. All are getting impatient with him, including the EU that is awaiting his departure expecting a new constructive dialogue to settle all the complicated issues with the post-Brexit Britain.
Why all these resignations? All the Ministers of Johnson Government have one serious refrain that Jo has failed to rebuild the country. With the massive mandate that he received from his people, all were expecting that he would be bringing a kind of Meiji Revolution to restore the glory, status and position of the country in the global power calculus.
Why people are unhappy with Johnson? Many feel that he has squandered a revolutionary mandate for reform. He has been ignoring what the UK is demanding from his government. Therefore, there is no justification for him to continue in any public office. Some of the sharpest criticisms thrown at him say that all the accusations against him such as his constant lies and torpedoing of the Westminster customs would have meant nothing if he had delivered to the public. Above all, he is found by many as purely incompetent. The way he has spoiled the massive mandate for his petty failings would remain in public memory for long. The liberal in the UK is presenting him as one who has broken the hallowed traditions of the Westminster. Some call him quasi-fascist. It is the continued failings for which he is highly condemned.
Even after repeated calls from trusted aides and colleagues, Johnson insisted that he had a “colossal mandate to keep going” from the voters. So, the beleaguered Prime Minister is on his job. He is not ready to listen to his colleagues who have already left their offices.
Despite resignations of top ministers and calls to leave office, Johnson is clinging on to power. This time he may have few options to survive.
(Dr Makhan Saikia has taught political science and international relations for over a decade in institutions of national and international repute after specialisation in globalisation and governance from Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai. He is the chief editor of the Journal of Global Studies, an international research journal)