AKIPRESS.COM - The topsy-turvy politics of Britain’s endlessly unpredictable summer took another stunning twist on Monday, with the selection by default of a prime minister who had advocated staying in the European Union but will now come under immediate pressure to fulfill her promise to lead the nation’s exit.

Theresa May, the hard-charging home affairs secretary, was elevated to Britain’s top job when Energy Minister Andrea Leadsom preemptively dropped out of the contest to succeed outgoing leader David Cameron, WP reports.

With only one candidate left in the race, the 59-year-old May was named the winner by acclaim, a decision met with table-thumping approval by her fellow Tories in Parliament. She will take the keys to 10 Downing Street on Wednesday, once Cameron has had a final turn in the weekly political combat session known as Prime Minister’s Questions.

By coalescing around May, her Conservative Party avoided what could have been a bruising months-long campaign that threatened to inflame the still-raw wounds of last month’s E.U. referendum.

But the move is also likely to accelerate the pressure on Britain to exit the E.U. European leaders have said Britain must act as quickly as possible to get out, as have Leadsom and other British advocates for a geopolitics-rattling divorce known as Brexit.