Meet Nigel Farage, the right-wing disrupter, who will now enter UK parliament after 8 attempts

Try, try and you shall succeed. This seems to be the motto of Reform UK leader Nigel Farage, who has finally been elected to the UK parliament on Friday on his eighth attempt. The 60-year-old arch-Brexiter won the constituency of Clacton in Essex.

Farage defeated the Conservative candidate, Giles Watling, who had represented the coastal constituency in Essex since 2017, winning 21,225 votes – a majority of 8,405. In a speech after his triumph, Farage served notice that his party would be turning its guns on Labour. “We are coming for Labour … be in no doubt about that,” he said, in a short speech at a leisure centre in the seaside town.

Farage also told reporters after his election that he would “speak up” and provide a challenge in government.

But who exactly is Nigel Farage? And how has he come to be known as one of Britain’s most controversial leaders?

A young Farage

Born on April 3, 1964, in Farnborough, Kent, England, Farage attended private school Dulwich College, in South London. Fellow pupils remember him as a student keen on provoking students and teachers with controversial statements.

A London Standard report reveals that when one teacher objected to his appointment as a prefect, her concerns were dismissed by the deputy head who said the teenager was well-known for provoking people “especially left-wing English teachers” with “no sense of humour”.

At 18, he decided not to go to university, becoming a trader on the London Metal Exchange in 1982. He has been married twice and has four children, with a rich family history that includes a grandfather who fought and sustained injuries during World War I.

Politics beckons

However, politics was calling for Farage. Initially, a Conservative, he quit the party in 1992 over the Maastricht Treaty and co-founded the UK Independence Party (UKIP). He first ran for UK parliament in 1994 in the Eastleigh by-election but failed in his attempt.

He was then elected to the European Parliament, as MEP for South-East England, in 1999 and stayed there until 2020. During his tenure as an MEP, he became a prominent voice in the European Parliament, advocating for British sovereignty and criticising EU policies. In 2010, he earned notoriety when he accused European Council president leader Herman Van Rompuy of having “the charisma of a damp rag” and “the appearance of a low-grade bank clerk”.

In 2006, he also became the leader of the UKIP party and made a name for himself for making controversial statements.

In 2010, his political career almost came to an end when the light aircraft he was travelling in became entangled in the UKIP banner it was towing, crashing into a field. Remarkably, he survived while suffering broken ribs and a punctured lung.

Brexit man

The UKIP’s success in the 2014 European elections — it won 24 seats and 27 per cent of the popular vote — was instrumental in forcing then Prime Minister David Cameron to bow to demands for an in-out referendum on Britain’s membership of the EU.

He became a massive booster for Brexit; the BBC has gone as far as to saying that Brexit was his baby. And when Britain finally voted yes on Brexit, he claimed personal responsibility for the decision, issuing a statement which read: “Dare to dream that the dawn is breaking on an independent United Kingdom.”

Furthermore, Donald Trump, who at the time was campaigning to be US president, had introduced him to thousands of supporters as “Mr Brexit”.

Post Brexit, Farage appeared to be angry and exhausted and announced that he was quitting (for a third time) as UKIP leader declaring: “I want my life back.”

Post-Brexit life

In February 2018, Farage formed the Brexit Party with Reuters noting that it had been approved by the Electoral Commission. And after Brexit took place, he renamed the party to Reform UK.

Following the COVID-19 pandemic during which Farage described lockdowns as “cruel and unnecessary”, announced in an interview with _The Telegrap_h that he was retiring from politics and resigning as leader of Reform UK. He took up a well-paid job as a presenter on GB News, while carefully leaving to door open for a return, taking the title of Reform UK’s “honorary president”.

In 2023, he also appeared in the Australian jungle on ITV’s famous reality show, I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here!, for which he was reputedly paid a cool £1.5 million. The show, no doubt, introduced him to a new generation of younger voters.

It was in September last year that he was ranked first on the New Statesman’s Right Power List, describing him as “the most influential person on the British right”.

Race to UK parliament

Farage spent most of the lead up to the 2024 UK general election campaign insisting he would not stand for the House of Commons. But on June 3, he said he will be Reform UK’s candidate in Clacton and take over as the party’s leader once again.

And as results keep pouring in, Farage achieved what he hadn’t until now; becoming an MP of the British parliament. Moreover, his party, the Reform UK, has won four seats.

Shortly after his own triumph, he was quoted as telling Reuters that he was determined to be as much of a “bloody nuisance” there as he was to European Union leaders as a member of the European Parliament.

“My plan is to build a mass national movement over the course of the next few years and hopefully be big enough to challenge the general election properly in 2029,” said Farage. “This Labour government will be in trouble very, very quickly and we will now be targeting Labour voters, we are coming for Labour — be in no doubt about that.”

As BBC reports, there are two Nigels: Nice Nigel and Nasty Nigel — a charismatic, optimistic, Happy Warrior or the angry populist Dark Knight. It is left to be seen which Nigel does he choose to retain now as he is poised to enter the House of Commons.

With inputs from agencies