After the election defeat, the British Conservative Party elects Kemi Badenoch as its new leader

Britain's Conservative Party elected Kemi Badenoch as its new leader on Saturday, seeking to recover from a crushing election defeat that ended 14 years in power.

Badenoch defeated rival lawmaker Robert Jenrick in a vote of nearly 100,000 members of the right-wing party. She is the first black woman to lead a major British political party.

Badenoch replaces former prime minister Rishi Sunak, who led the Conservatives to their worst election result since 1832 in July. The Conservatives lost more than 200 seats, falling to 121 seats.

The new leader's daunting task is to try to restore the party's reputation after years of division, scandal and economic turmoil, condemn Labor Prime Minister Keir Starmer's policies on key issues such as the economy and immigration, and support the Conservatives in the to return to power in the next elections. due by 2029.

Badenoch, business secretary in the previous Conservative government, was born in London to Nigerian parents and spent much of her childhood in the West African country.

The 44-year-old former software engineer portrays herself as a disruptor, advocating for a low-tax, free-market economy and promising to “rewire, reboot and reprogram” the British state.

Badenoch, a critic of multiculturalism and self-proclaimed enemy of the woke, was criticized for recently saying that “not all cultures are equally valid” and for suggesting that maternity pay was excessive.

In a race that lasted more than three months, Conservative MPs whittled down the field of six candidates in a series of votes before leaving the final two to the broader party membership.

Both finalists came from the right of the party and argued they could win back voters from Reform UK, the far-right, anti-immigrant party led by populist politician Nigel Farage that has eaten up Conservative support.

But the party also lost many voters to the victorious Labor Party and the centrist Liberal Democrats, and some conservatives fear a rightward turn will alienate the party from public opinion.