LONDON: Rishi Sunak topped the second round of voting by Conservative MPs in the Tory leadership race on Thursday with 101 votes whilst the only other Indian-origin candidate in the race, attorney general Suella Braverman, was knocked out of the contest.
Trade minister Penny Mordaunt came second with 83 votes, followed by foreign secretary Liz Truss with 64 votes. Former equalities minister Kemi Badenoch was fourth with 49 votes and chairman of the foreign affairs committee Tom Tugendhat was fifth with 32 votes. These five candidates have made it through to the third round of voting, which will take place on Monday.
Sunak, the son-in-law of Infosys founder NR Narayana Murthy, had topped the first round with 88 votes. But whilst he is performing well with Tory MPs and is widely expected to make it to the final two candidates to be put to the party membership, a snap YouGov poll of Tory party members — who will take the final call — found more support for Penny Mordaunt and Kemi Badenoch than for Sunak. Mordaunt has now overtaken Sunak as the bookies’ favourite to be the next UK PM.
