The U.K.’s finance minister Sajid Javid has unexpectedly resigned from his post in Boris Johnson’s government, as the U.K. Prime Minister embarks on the first shakeup of his top team since his emphatic election victory in December.
Javid was reportedly told to sack his entire team of advisors to keep the job. Instead, he chose to resign.
Ahead of Johnson’s reshuffle on Thursday, government sources briefed the media that the changes would be minor. Javid’s resignation changes that.
The son of a Pakistani bus driver who rose through the ranks of the Conservative Party, Javid was Home Secretary (interior minister) before being appointed Chancellor of the Exchequer (the formal title for Britain’s finance minister) when Johnson became Prime Minister in July. He had run for the top job himself in the Conservatives’ internal leadership contest over the summer of 2019, and was tipped by some for a future role leading the party.
Replacing him as finance minister — just four weeks ahead of the U.K. budget announcement, the biggest date in the Chancellor’s calendar — is Rishi Sunak, former chief secretary to the Treasury and a rising star in the Conservative Party.
Javid’s resignation will cast fresh scrutiny on the role of Johnson’s top advisor, Dominic Cummings, a divisive figure in Westminster who wants swingeing reforms of the U.K. government system, and has been unafraid to sack ministerial aides —and now, apparently, ministers — if they refuse to cooperate.
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