Vaughan Gething is set to become the first minister of Wales after he was elected on Saturday as the leader of Welsh Labour Party.
The minister for economy won 51.7 percent of the votes while sole rival Jeremy Miles took 48.3, according to Welsh Labour.
In total, 57.8 percent of members and 9.4 percent of affiliates voted, giving an overall turnout of 16.1 percent.
The result was announced on Saturday morning in a lecture hall at Cardiff University.
Mr. Gething, 49, is expected to take over as first minister on Wednesday when a vote will be held in the Senedd.
Opposition parties can put forward their own candidates, but the role of first minister is unlikely to fall into the hand of another with Labour holding half of the seats.
Succeeding Mark Drakeford, the Zambian-born politician will become Wale’s fifth leader since the National Assembly, or the Senedd, was established in 1999.
Mr. Gething was born in Zambia in 1974, where his father, a Welsh vet from Ogmore-by-Sea in Glamorgan, met his mother, a chicken farmer. He moved to the UK with his family when he was two.
He unsuccessfully stood for the Mid and West Wales seat at the first National Assembly elections in 1999, before becoming councillor for the Butetown area of Cardiff in 2004.
He stood for the Senedd elections again in 2011, when he successfully took the Cardiff South and Penarth Seat.
This is the second time he has run for the top job, having stood in 2018 against Mark Drakeford.
Addressing Labour’s membership after winning the election on Saturday, Mr. Gething said a “page in the book” of Welsh history has been turned.
“Not just because I have the honour of becoming the first black leader in any European country, but because the generational dial has jumped too,” he said.
“Devolution is not something that I have had to get used to or adapt to or apologise for.
“Devolution—Welsh solutions to Welsh problems and opportunities—is in my blood, it’s what I’ve always known through my adult political life, and that is the same for a growing number of our citizens.”
Mr. Gething encouraged party members to “use this moment as a starting point, for a more confident march into the future ... on behalf of the generation that too often is being asked to pick up the pieces and the bill for those who came before them.”
Plaid Cymru leader Rhun ap Iorwerth congratulated Mr. Gething, adding that he will inherit “significant challenges” if he becomes first minister.
“He has sat around the Cabinet table and held key portfolios while Wales’s economy has stagnated, NHS waiting lists have grown, and child poverty remains a national scandal. Nothing said during the leadership campaign suggests that we will now see a gear-change in addressing these huge challenges,” he said.
“But he also brings his own personal issues. It is a matter of deep concern that we now have an incoming first minister who before even taking up the highest public office is facing serious allegations and questions about his judgment.”
During Mr. Gething’s leadership campaign, concerns have been raised over £200,000 of donations he received from Dauson Environmental Group Ltd., whose subsidiary Atlantic Recycling was found guilty of environmental offences in January and was fined £300,000 for one of its workers’ deaths in February after it pleaded guilty to breaching health and safety at work rules.
Mr. ap Iorwerth said Mr. Gething should “at the very least” return the £200,000 campaign donation.”
Andrew RT Davies, leader of the Welsh Conservatives, predicted “business as usual,” saying the new first minister is a “cut of the same cloth” as Mr. Drakeford.
He said the Conservatives are “happy to work” with him “to get rid of 20MPH, to change the sustainable farming scheme and make sure there’s no more politicians coming to Cardiff Bay and to invest that money in the health service.”
Mr. Davies accused Labour of having “a lot of extreme views” on its backbenches, promising to give Mr. Gething the votes to “deliver common sense” and deliver improvements in the Welsh NHS, education, and the economy.
