NEven in retreat, Boris Johnson showed his failed successor, Liz Truss, what he can do and she can’t: paste over contradictions with big words and gestures. The Conservative, who failed a few weeks ago due to the scandals he had made himself in 10 Downing Street, presented himself as a winner sentence by sentence.
Not only did he take the high formal hurdles to participate in the election for the new party leader and prime minister. After his “massive election victory” three years ago, he still enjoys so much approval at the party base that his chances are “very good” of returning to the top of the government after a hastily scheduled primary election by Friday – less than two months after his departure . And, with Johnson, so much breast drumming is part of it even in times of deepest national uncertainty: He would be able to lead the Conservative Party, which was lying on the ground, to victory again in the general elections in 2024.
Johnson explained that he is not running now, saying that he had not come to an understanding with the other two applicants Rishi Sunak and Penny Mordaunt and that he “sadly” had to realize that his candidacy was therefore “not the right one”. One can guess what this “understanding” would have looked like – Sunak should have placed himself behind Johnson again, to whose downfall he had played a major role in the summer.
The fear of defeat
One can assume that Johnson actually felt a great fear: that he could very well lose to Sunak as the supposed guarantor of a return to calm waters. Or that, should he win again, he would all too quickly be overtaken by the scandals that had cost him his office before and have not yet been politically resolved.
Either way, as with his Downing Street farewell in September, Johnson sounded less like a man about to give up his politician’s hat for good, and more like someone averse to risk now in hopes of a triumphant return later to be kept open – if the polls for the Conservatives no longer look quite as disastrous as they do at the moment.
A mandate only from the markets? Rishi Sunak in London on Sunday
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Image: AP
It is uncertain how many of Johnson’s faction and party supporters will now gravitate towards Penny Mordaunt, out of defiance and contempt for the ‘kingslayer’ Sunak. The race is not over yet, but the prospects are good. Although Sunak was Johnson’s Treasury Secretary and has always been a clear supporter of Brexit, the relief among Britain’s partners in Europe is palpable. “The markets” have already revealed their optimism; Johnson’s retreat boosted the British pound.
Precisely therein lies the danger of the next self-deception in the kingdom. Even a Prime Minister Sunak would only have a very narrow mandate; he would only have been made prime minister by the Tory faction, or by (part of) members of that party which, by all polls, was going to be a crushing loser in a general election soon to come. Truss had unrestrainedly overplayed this mandate and wanted to transform the country. Sunak is not suspected of being a revolutionary. But in times of war and crisis, he would have no choice but to make painful decisions that would have a deep impact on the wallets and lives of many Britons.
The approval of financial markets, foreign partners and professional policy observers cannot replace legitimacy through general elections. Anyone who ignores this is fertilizing the field of populism. Boris Johnson is just one who will be watching closely when harvest time arrives.
