Dublin: Ireland’s governing Fine Gael party elected Leo Varadkar as its new leader on June 2.
The 38-year-old son of an Indian immigrant will succeed Enda Kenny as prime minister indicating the country’s rapid social change.
Varadkar overcame ministerial colleague Simon Coveney as expected, winning an overwhelming majority among the Centre-right party’s lawmakers, who hope the straight-talking Dubliner can lead them to third successive term for the first time.
Bar an unexpected development, Varadkar will be voted in as prime minister when parliament next sits on June 13 and become the once-staunchly Catholic country’s first openly gay premier and the youngest person ever to hold the office.
His election marks another chapter in the social change that has swept through the country of 4.6 million people that only decriminalized homosexuality in 1993 but became the first country to adopt gay marriage via a popular vote in 2015.
It also shows another face of modern-day Ireland. Varadkar’s father Ashok, who like his son is a doctor, was born in Mumbai in India. He met his wife Miriam, an Irish nurse, in England’s Slough in the 1960s. Then in the 1970s they moved to Ireland where Varadkar was born.
The generational shift from Kenny, 66, who led the party for 15 years and has been prime minister since 2011, will likely be matched with Varadkar’s cabinet choices. Paschal Donohoe, 42, is expected to be promoted to finance minister, replacing the retiring Michael Noonan.
The victory of Varadkar, who came came out as gay in 2015, in the Fine Gael leadership contest, which took place on June 2 after outgoing Kenny announced his resignation in May, marks another significant step forward for equality in the country, after 2015’s gay marriage referendum.
Varadkar will is the first from an ethnic minority background. His position will be confirmed later this month when parliament resumes after a break, report agencies.
Varadkar faced a stiffer-than-expected challenge in the Fine Gael election from his rival, Simon Coveney. The Cork-born Irish housing minister is popular with the party’s grassroots, particularly in Fine Gael’s more conservative, rural redoubts.
Speaking after the final votes were tallied in Dublin, Varadkar said he was delighted, humbled and honored to win. Coveney joked that at least his children would be pleased that he had lost.
Kenny said Varadkar had his full support. “This is a tremendous honor for him and I know he will devote his life to improving the lives of people across our country,” he said. “I want to also thank and pay tribute to Simon Coveney for making the leadership election a real contest. This has been a wonderful exercise in democracy for the Fine Gael party.”
Under internal Fine Gael rules, the parliamentary party constitutes 65 percent of the vote, party members 25 percent and city and country councillors 10 percent.
Coveney captured majority support among grassroots members, but Varadkar won over the crucial parliamentarian college.
Varadkar’s father Ashok, who comes from the western Indian city of Mumbai, met his Irish mother Miriam while they both worked at an English hospital.
While the international media gathered in Dublin have focused on Varadkar’s sexuality and immigrant family background, Ireland’s news organizations zeroed in on his economic policies.
Some commentators dubbed Varadkar “the Thatcherite” candidate after his comments during the two-week leadership contest that he wanted to be the champion “of those who get up early in the morning.”
LGBT groups in Ireland welcomed the domestic focus on Varadkar’s ideology. “I think it’s really significant that both his party and the media in Ireland focused on his policies, rather than him simply being a gay man who wants to lead the country,” said Brian Finnegan, the editor of Gay Community News in Dublin.
Varadkar, a doctor educated at Triunity College Dublin, entered Irish politics in 2004, when he polled almost 5,000 votes in a local government election in the Dublin West constituency. Three years later, he was elected to represent the area in parliament.
In 2014, he became Ireland’s minister for health and, after Fine Gael suffered losses in last year’s general election, he entered a minority coalition as minister for social protection.
In the 2015 interview with RTE radio when he came out, Vradkar said: “It’s not something that defines me. I’m not a half-Indian politician, or a doctor politician, or a gay politician, for that matter. It’s just part of who I am. It doesn’t define me. It is part of my character, I suppose.”