Brexit, the British vote to leave the European Union (EU), has become nothing short of a feud and we may be seeing the emergence of a Brexit dictatorship.

Prime Minister Theresa May, thrice failed to pass a negotiated Brexit deal in the British parliament over the issue of the Irish border backstop. Upon her resignation in May 2019 over Brexit, Boris Johnson, a conservative and populist, took office in July 2019, in somewhat a hard Brexit coup, with a promise to deliver on Brexit, deal or no deal. He has since demonstrated he is readiness to deploy authoritarianism in order to achieve his Brexit strategy.

When the British parliament tabled new legislation this week designed to prevent a no-deal Brexit, Johnson and his cabinet threatened to ignore any such bill and the Prime Minister went further to threaten Conservative Members of Parliament (MPs) with dismissal were they to back the bill.

This comes as the Queen and Boris Johnson have considered to prorogue or temporarily suspend Parliament, another coup dressed as politics as usual, in order to ensure the successful implementation of Johnson’s own Brexit execution plan.

Boris Johnson, though a populist was not popularly elected. Proroguing the parliament with the British monarch, who is also obviously not elected, gives Britain nothing short of the coloration of a failed State. But this is the glorious British Empire. Such terms as failed, unstable or weak State only apply to Africa.

But Britain is becoming a dictatorship, somewhat the natural course of populism? Threatening elected officials with dismissal is termed autocracy in Africa but it may instead be viewed as “strong leadership” when it comes to the United Kingdom (UK) of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

Being dragged by the EU over the backstop issue is no funny thing and it gave the UK the semblance of a weak state. However, while many had hoped to see strong leadership over the Brexit problem, it was hardly meant to be a dictatorship-type, but one whose decisions and actions are able to be secured through the force of argument and consensus. Perhaps Boris Johnson would have to rethink his approach to Brexit or risk installing a Brexit dictatorship in a country often tagged as working constitutional monarchy.