In a totally unexpected move, Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar on Wednesday announced that he will step down as soon as his Fine Gael party names a new leader.“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 said it was the right time for him to step down and that there was no “real reason” behind his decision .“I have nothing else lined up I have nothing in mind. I have no definite personal or political plans,” he said.Varadkar in 2017 became the first gay prime minister of the once-staunchly Catholic country and the youngest person to hold the office. 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 was born in Dublin and studied medicine at Trinity College Dublin. He spent several years as a non-consultant hospital doctor, eventually qualifying as a general practitioner in 2010. In 2004, he joined Fine Gael and became a member of Fingal County Council and later served as Deputy Mayor of Fingal. He was elected to Dáil Éireann for the first time in 2007.[1] During the campaign for the 2015 same-sex marriage referendum, Varadkar came out as gay, becoming the first serving Irish minister to do so.