Rishi Sunak tops first round of voting in UK Prime Minister’s race

London: Former British finance minister Rishi Sunak won the first round of voting to replace Boris Johnson as the country’s prime minister and leader of the Conservative Party. Sunak secured 88 votes of Tory MPs, ahead of junior trade minister Penny Mordaunt on 67 and Foreign Secretary Liz Truss on 50.

With this, there are six candidates remaining in the running to succeed Johnson. Two candidates – finance minister Nadhim Zahawi and former foreign minister Jeremy Hunt were knocked out.

Sunak, whose resignation last week led to Johnson’s downfall, got the backing of 88 out of the Conservative Party’s 358 lawmakers.

Zahawi, who assumed charge as the finance minister after Sunak’s resignation, and former foreign minister Hunt were eliminated as they couldn’t secure the minimum benchmark of 30 votes. Three other candidates were knocked out earlier.