Britain‘s Conservative Party on Saturday elected Kemi Badenoch as its new leader, as it seeks to recover from a devastating election defeat that ended 14 years in power.
Badenoch (pronounced BADE-enock) defeated her rival, MP Robert Jenrick, in a vote by nearly 100,000 members of the centre-right party, becoming the first Black woman to lead a major British political party.
She replaces former Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, who, in July, led the Conservatives to their worst election result since 1832. The party lost over 200 seats, reducing its total to 121.
Badenoch now faces the challenging task of rebuilding the party’s reputation after years of internal division, scandal, and economic upheaval. She aims to scrutinise Labour Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s policies on critical issues like the economy and immigration, with the goal of returning the Conservatives to power at the next general election, which must take place by 2029.
Previously the Business Secretary in the Conservative government, Badenoch was born in London to Nigerian parents and spent much of her childhood in Nigeria.
The 44-year-old former software engineer portrays herself as a disruptor, advocating a low-tax, free-market economy and promising to “rewire, reboot, and reprogramme” the British state.
A critic of multiculturalism and self-described opponent of “woke” culture, Badenoch has faced criticism for recent comments, including that “not all cultures are equally valid” and her suggestion that maternity pay is overly generous.
The leadership contest, which lasted over three months, saw Conservative MPs narrow the field from six candidates through a series of votes, before the final two were presented to the wider party membership.
Both final candidates came from the right of the party and argued they could win back voters from Reform UK, the hard-right, anti-immigration party led by populist Nigel Farage, which has been siphoning Conservative support.
However, the Conservatives also lost significant numbers of voters to Labour, the winning party, and to the centrist Liberal Democrats, leading some members to worry that veering further right could distance the party from mainstream public opinion.