The position of Boris Johnson, the champion of political survival, is becoming even more precarious, Britannia reporter Pasi Möhänen estimates.
17:45•Updated 17:45
“It’s just a superficial wound!”
That’s what the knight of the British Monty Python comedy troupe’s classic sketch claimed, who vowed to keep fighting even though his arms and legs had been knocked off.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson the situation is starting to look similar.
Johnson’s resignation was already expected yesterday, Tuesday, after the finance minister Rishi Sunak and the Minister of Health Savid Javid announced their separation.
In his resignation letter, Sunak said that the people have the right to expect the country’s leadership to take their duties seriously. Javid, on the other hand, estimates that the current British leadership does not act in the name of national interests. He also said that the people must be able to demand high morals from the leadership.
In practice, the resigned ministers accused the prime minister of dishonesty in their resignation letters, which is a harsh word from two important former colleagues.
During the day, a number of deputy ministers have also left the government.
Boris Johnson survived at the beginning of June for a no-confidence vote in the parliament, but even then more than 40 percent of his party members demanded his resignation.
Since then, dissatisfaction has grown.
The party lost two important by-elections a couple of weeks ago, and according to studies, the conservatives would suffer a big loss if the parliamentary elections were held now.
According to a survey published today, a record 69 percent of the people demand Johnson’s resignation.
Johnson’s supporters are starting to lose their cool, and the reason is also the self-preservation instinct of party members. Even more of them believe that those who support the prime minister may drown politically along with Johnson.
The last staple for the resigned ministers was that Johnson claimed to have been unaware that the party whip Chris Pincher was guilty of sexual harassment. When it became clear that Johnson had been informed, he claimed to have forgotten and apologized for supporting Pincher.
Even if the case alone would not be a fault worthy of dismissal, the trust in Johnson’s judgment, which had been eroded due to the parties held during the corona bans, crumbled even more.
Nobody Boris Johnson those who have followed the career cannot rule out the possibility that a prime minister who defies the political laws of nature could still pull a rabbit out of his hat – and get away with this too. There are still supporters left in the party and external factors can come into play, as the Russian attack on Ukraine already did once.
It put Johnson’s problems aside, and since then he has been praised for his tough security policy – which, admittedly, would very likely have been the line of interventionist Britain anyway.
But now even pro-Johnson commentators in Britain widely believe that continuing as prime minister has become impossible. It is no longer just a question of when he will leave, and not of Johnson still ruling Britain in the 2030s, as he himself recently threatened.
Practically speaking is more difficult, as Johnson’s confidence cannot be voted on again for almost a year, according to an internal rule of the Conservative Party. However, there is a loud demand in the party to change the rule and this may be possible within weeks.
In addition to being forced to resign, it is also possible that Johnson himself would conclude that his time has come – even in the next few hours.
That’s unlikely, though, as Johnson can’t be blamed for a lack of persistence. Neither is the black knight in the Monty Python sketch who, while still armless and legless, threatened to bite King Arthur as he tried to pass.
But the knight of the sketch was no longer a force to be taken very seriously, and a Prime Minister who languishes in an endless countdown is not good for Britain either.
Political instability brings more economic problems to the country suffering from the worst inflation among the G7 countries – and erodes its credibility internationally.