OBAMA, THE ASCENT OF INDIAN RISHI SUNAK; A MISLEADING EUPHORIA

Sunday, October 30, 2022

Suddenly, Rishi Sunak rejected seven weeks ago by majority Conservative members defied the odds as an Indian man to be crowned party leader and UK prime minister without any vote after rivals dropped out in what many see as deal-making where 195 MPs endorsed his nomination.  A failed state would have been castigated for failing democracy.

Sunak’s ascent is historic and reflects progress in political mobility in the British dwindling although as he arrived at 10 Dawning Street on coronation day this week he was greeted with boos and heckles. This isn’t entirely surprising because, after-all, Donald J Trump still grumbles that Barrack Obama shouldn’t have been eligible for US president.

In 2008, the election of Obama with Kenyan origins as first black US President caused euphoria as Africans waited in futility for salvation. With hindsight, it’s hard pin-pointing broad transformation for US Blacks attributable to Obama. In Africa it’s even harder to justify that euphoria because Obama walked off stage more as a footnote. In India, many leaders were reported celebrating Sunak’s coronation, yet they have made the ‘lower Castes’ unable to rise beyond street sweepers, latrine cleaners, roadside fruit and vegetable vendors.

The British spent many decades worrying that Russians and Chinese where seeking to influence their politics and democracy, but couldn’t notice that India, a former colony would produce Sunak via Kenyan and Tanzanian parentage as amnesia prevented them from seeing global dynamics. The agony in British politics is hopefully over, but perhaps temporarily because although it may not be said loudly, many must be disappointed that an Indian and practicing Hindu is now Prime minister of a country where the Church of England is the State religion.

The media coverage has described Sunak’s rise as of a man of colour, Indian and practicing Hindu, whose parents were born in East Africa, perhaps meant to emphasize that he’ isn’t one of them. While the calls for a general election maybe good, many hope that it would provide majority whites beyond the Conservative MPs who installed Sunak with an opportunity to oust him.

Many whites must be seething in suppressed anger that an Indian, a racial subgroup thought decades ago to lack the ability to govern itself is now the leader of the ‘civilised’ nation that spread ‘modern enlightenment’ to its colonies. Although Sunak was the frontrunner among MPs in the August race when his name was put to the general party membership, they found it preferable to elect a white woman than a brown man. Penny Mordaunt’s belated withdrawal during this second tussle was viewed as an attempt to go into a second party membership vote at which Sunak would have probably failed.

Sunak’s rise through the political machinations is momentous considering his immigrant background and the fact he had been MP for only seven years. Many say that he was buoyed Truss’s tanking the economy, causing global turmoil, and fears of another Johnson at the helm. During the last decades following 9/11, Asians in the US and Western Europe have been the targets of racist and xenophobic relentless campaigns which couldn’t distinguish religion, politics and skin colour, and in Britain, Brexit partly represented that war. 

The ascent is great especially for himself after all, being said to be wealthier than King Charles III, then he was already one of them. Like Obama’s Presidency didn’t make life any better for Africans, and US blacks as had been anticipated because they didn’t have much in common with a Harvard educated Obama or Etonian Kwasi Kwarteng, so won’t many Indians in UK connect with Sukan beyond Hinduism, trade and ethnicity. Lest we forget, another Indian, Priti Patel as Johnson’s Home Secretary was the architect of deporting Africans to Rwanda because they’re not wanted in the UK, a policy which would have denied Sunak’s parents staying in Britain.

Many people from minorities who have risen in US and European capitals often suffer from the syndrome of the need to demonstrate that they love US and Europe more than their kin and kith, have had a particular duty to defend their countries of domicile more. Usually they show a special appreciation for being Americans or Europeans, and will do everything to placate themselves from Whites who may instinctively mistrust them.

It has been the trend of minorities whenever they rise to tell their childhood dog whistle stories as a way to broaden political acceptability. We may remember Obama’s three books; A Promised Land, The Audacity of Hope, and Dreams from My Father.

Multimillionaire Sunak, educated at an exclusive college and married into a billionaire family will try to downplay his privileged background to win more widespread support yet everything about his life and upbringing is at odds with that of millions struggling to find work, buy food and pay other bills. It’s more authentic when Colin Powel (RIP), Condoleezza Rice, Obama, Kamala Harris, Sunak, and ilk that have succeeded to high positions of decision making ensured that more underprivileged people can get similar routes to good opportunities.