A BRITISH politician of Ghanaian parentage has been appointed as Chancellor (Finance Minister) in the government of the new Conservative Prime Minister, Liz Truss.
Kwasi Kwarteng, whose parents came to the UK from Ghana as students in the 1960s, had become the first black Conservative Secretary of State – a Cabinet position – when he was put in charge of the Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy in January this year, Desmond Davies reports.
He had been serving as Minister of State in the same ministry.
Kwarteng, 47, who was born in North East London, was previously Parliamentary Under Secretary of State in the Department for Exiting the European Union from November 2018 to July 2019.
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Kwarteng, though, was not the first black person to attend Cabinet meetings within Conservative Party ranks.
The honour goes to
.
He has now been appointed as Foreign Secretary by Truss.
Kwarteng’s mother was a barrister while his father was an economist at the Commonwealth Secretariat in London.
He won a scholarship to Eton College, which was founded in 1440 and where current school fees are £46,296 a year.
Kwarteng then went on to read classics and history at Trinity College, Cambridge University, and then attended Harvard University on a Kennedy Scholarship.
He earned a PhD in economic history from Cambridge in 2000.
Before becoming a Member of Parliament in 2010, Kwarteng worked as an analyst in financial services.
His passions include history, music and languages and he has authored several books, including Ghosts of Empire, War and Gold, and Thatcher’s Trial: 180 Days that Created a Conservative Icon.
Kwarteng was part of a group of MPs in 2011 who set up the Free Enterprise Group that aims to ‘free individuals to create, innovate and take risks’.
African leaders, who appear to have neglected the continent’s young people, would do well to heed this advice.
Kwarteng’s friends have been talking up his appointment and highlighting the close relationship he has with Truss.
One told the Conservative-leaning newspaper, The Daily Telegraph: ‘They have a strong personal friendship and they see completely eye to eye on economic policy.
‘More than that, Kwasi will not try to stand in Liz’s way, because he recognises that the Chancellor is only the second Lord of the Treasury, while the Prime Minister is the first.’
Apart from Kwarteng and Cleverly, Kemi Badenoch, whose parents are from Nigeria, is also in Truss’ Cabinet as International Trade Secretary.
She put up a spirited performance during the Conservative leadership contest by reaching the last four.
Suella Braverman, who is of Indian ancestry and whose parents emigrated to the UK from Kenya and Mauritius in the 1960s, is Home Secretary.
For the first time in British politics, none of what are termed the four great offices of state – Prime Minister, Chancellor, Home Secretary and Foreign Secretary – is held by a white male.
In making these appointments, the Conservatives appear to have stolen a march on the opposition Labour Party.
Although another British politician of Ghanaian descent, Paul Boateng, was the UK’s first black Cabinet Minister when Prime Minister Tony Blair’s Labour government appointed him as Chief Secretary to the Treasury (Finance Ministry) in 2002, the party that espouses equality has not matched its rhetoric with reality.
It has never had a female leader, while the Conservatives have had three – Margaret Thatcher, Theresa May and now Truss – all of whom became Prime Minister.
A Labour councillor in South London told Africa Briefing that he had warned members of his party that they were taking the ethnic minority vote for granted.
He pointed out that it was becoming obvious that black (those from Africa and the Caribbean) and Asian voters tended to hold conservative values such as education and hard work.
This could lead to more support for the Conservatives from the UK’s ethnic minorities, he noted.
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