Badenoch, black leader of Conservatives

It should not perhaps come as a surprise that Nigerian-origin Kemi Badenoch should have become the leader of the Conservative Party after the Indian-origin Rishi Sunak. Both of them belong to racial minority groups in Britain. Sunak became the leader of the party after the disastrous Liz Truss’s short-lived government. Badenoch takes over the reins after a disastrous electoral defeat in July, where the party has been reduced to 121 seats from the 365 it had won in 2019. It is also a fact that Sunak and Badenoch came when the party had been in power from 2010 onward. The cyclical downturn of the party was in many ways inevitable. It can be expected that Badenoch has a better chance of leading the party to victory in 2029 because the Labour government under Prime Minister Keir Starmer does not look too promising.

Badenoch’s election as Conservative Party leader is a clear reflection of the fact that Britain is now truly a multi-racial polity, and that as befitting the oldest democracy of the modern world, it has shown that every citizen has the opportunity to rise to the highest position. It still seems surprising that the Conservative Party has chosen Sunak and Badenoch, one after the other, when it is supposed to be the party of the British Establishment, while the Liberals and the Labour were the parties that kept their doors open to all, at least in principle.

The surprising thing is that both Sunak and Badenoch are British Conservatives with conviction. Sunak was less ideological in his commitment though he was in practices a free market advocate. Badenoch believes in free markets as a matter of ideological tenet. And she is also a strong believer in individual rights, and she would want to shrink the state like Margaret Thatcher tried to do.

This is indeed the striking aspect of the modern conservative, his or her belief that the state should not be allowed to interfere in the life of the individuals. The reason that Badenoch won the party leadership election is that the majority of the members, the 130,000 plus members, were convinced that she believes in the conservative principles. It is also interesting that Conservative leaders like Badenoch, Sunak, Suella Braverman and Priti Patel are all tough on migration, tough on law and order. These leaders are true-blue conservatives.

Badenoch, like other conservatives, will have a tough time matching her conservative belief in free markets with the harsh reality of the brittleness of the free market economies, where financial meltdown of the 2007-08 has roiled the global economic system.

It is no more credible to swear by free markets as it was to swear by failed communism. But what will stand in good stead for Badenoch is her penchant for speaking out. She told the party members that it is time to recognise that the party had made mistakes and it has to take course correction.

The other aspect of Badenoch which will endear her to the party faithful is her disdain for the left. She said one of the mistakes of the Conservative governments was to pursue left-wing policies. She has hit out against institutional leftist biases. She has also pitted herself against the liberal extremist positions of the Woke lobby.

Badenoch is willing to take the most unpopular positions on the basis of principle and belief. It is a quality that will make her stand out as a leader. Britain and the Conservatives can take pride in the fact that they chose Badenoch, the first black woman to head a political party in the country. British sense of fairplay has lived up to its reputation.