The political ‘playbook’ deployed by the controversial strategy firm Crosby Textor Fullbrook Partners (CTF) to get Boris Johnson into 10 Downing Street three years ago is being used again to turn the newly appointed chancellor, Nadhim Zahawi, into the UK’s next prime minister.
Zahawi, who has been chancellor of the exchequer for less than two days, is being advised by Mark Fullbrook, the political strategist who ran Johnson’s successful leadership bid in 2019, openDemocracy can reveal. Once an associate of Australian guru Lynton Crosby at CTF, Fullbrook left earlier this year to set up his own firm, Fullbrook Strategies, with Crosby himself on the advisory board.
According to Whitehall sources close to Zahawi, it was Fullbrook who suggested the private, no-holds-barred confrontation with Johnson, where he allegedly told the PM that he wanted the job of chancellor or else he would exit the government. The ploy left Johnson with little choice than to appoint Zahawi.
