Rishi SunakBritish Prime Minister, has expelled from his ministerial position the president of the Conservative PartyNadhim Zahawi, in full scandal for tax irregularities during his time as Finance Minister.
The investigation was left in the hands of the new Ethics adviser to the party, Sir Laurie Magnus, in charge of evaluating whether this scandal could end up leading to the expulsion of Zahawi from the position of “minister without portfolio” of the British Government that he occupies as president of the Conservative Party.
Once the internal investigation was completed, Magnus sent a letter in which he found that Zadhawi had failed to meet the requirements of being an “honest, open and exemplary leader” and exhibited conduct “below the high standards that the prime minister rightly expects of those who serve in his government.”
After learning of this assessment, Sunak has written to Zadhawi to inform him of his intention to remove him “from his position in His Majesty’s Government” for committing a “violation of the Ministerial Code.”
The prime minister has added, in his letter, Zahawi should be “extremely proud” of his “extensive achievements in Government over the past five years”, in particular, his “successful oversight of the vaccine acquisition and deployment program against COVID-19”.
Zahawi was forced to pay a fine to settle a dispute over non-payment of taxes regarding the polling company YouGov, in whose foundation he participated in the year 2000 before making the leap to the House of Commons.
According to the BBC, the former minister’s tax problems were resolved between July and September 2022 and the payment would be around 5 million pounds (almost 5.7 million euros), although there were many voices calling for his resignation given the seriousness of the case.
