Liz Truss succeeded Boris Johnson; defeated Rishi Sunak in race to be party leader.
Liz Truss will go down as the UK Prime Minister with the shortest time in office — 45 days when she announced her resignation today, plus a week or so until a new leader is chosen.
The ruling Conservative Party will elect its new leader within the next week, until which time she will remain the PM, she said. Counting that too, Liz Truss would remain much behind the earlier shortest tenure, 119 days served by George Canning in the 1820s.
She was in office for a tenure shorter than the time it took for her election as the party leader. After Boris Johnson resigned on July 7, the party held an election in which Liz Truss faced a challenge from former finance minister Rishi Sunak. The results came on September 5, after almost two months.
“The toughest job interview ever” is how Liz Truss had described it then.
Party lawmakers say her most likely successor will either be Rishi Sunak, or Penny Mordaunt, who came third in the race just six weeks ago, said news agency Reuters.
At 45 days, she now has the unenviable record of being the shortest-serving Conservative Party leader, no matter whether the party be in power or not.