•PM Leo Varadkar
Ireland’s prime minister Leo Varadkar says he is stepping down as the leader of the governing Fine Gael party.
In the surprise announcement today, Varadkar said he would also relinquish his role as prime minister as soon as a successor is chosen, reports Aljazeera.
“I am resigning the presidency and leadership of Fine Gael and will resign as taoiseach [prime minister] as soon as my successor is able to take up that office,” Varadkar told reporters in Dublin.
He said he had asked for a new leader of the party to be chosen on April 6, allowing a new prime minister to be elected after parliament’s Easter break.
Varadkar, 45, said it was the right time for him to step aside.
“My reasons for stepping down now are personal and political, but mainly political,” he said without elaborating.
“I have nothing else lined up I have nothing in mind. I have no definite personal or political plans,” he added.
Varadkar, in 2017, became the first gay prime minister of Ireland, a once-staunchly Catholic country and the youngest person to hold the office.
Varadkar, whose mother is Irish and father is Indian, was also Ireland’s first biracial Irish prime minister.
He also played a leading role in campaigns to legalize same-sex marriage, approved in a 2015 referendum, and to repeal a ban on abortion, which passed in a vote in 2018.
In his resignation statement, Varadkar said, “I’m proud that we have made the country a more equal and more modern place.”
He returned to the premiership in 2022 under a rotation arrangement struck between Fine Gael and Fianna Fail, the two largest parties in a three-party coalition with the smaller Green Party.
Varadkar has faced growing discontent within Fine Gael. Ten of the party’s lawmakers, almost a third of the total, have announced they will not run for reelection.
Earlier this month, voters rejected the government’s position in referendums on two constitutional amendments.
Changes backed by Varadkar that would have broadened the definition of family and removed language about a woman’s role in the home were resoundingly defeated.
The result sparked criticism that the pro-change campaign had been lacklustre and confusing.
Varadkar recently returned from Washington, where he met President Joe Biden and other political leaders as part of the Irish prime minister’s traditional St. Patrick’s Day visit to the United States.
The next election must be called by early 2025.
