He is a former child refugee who founded the UK’s best known polling company and served as chancellor – before failing to become leader of the Conservatives. But Nadhim Zahawi is now Reform UK’s most prominent defector, and perhaps the biggest fish that Nigel Farage has managed to net yet. The Iraqi-born businessman has had a tumultuous, if upward-bound, career in politics – becoming the chancellor for 63 days, before quitting, then joining Rishi Sunak’s government, only for him to be sacked as Tory chairman for breaching the ministerial code. Politics live – follow latest But now Mr Zahawi is back in frontline politics once again, declaring that he wants to “get behind Mr Farage and his team”. So, how did the child refugee become Reform UK’s most prominent defector? Early years Mr Zahawi was born in Bagdad and spent his early years growing up as part of an influential Kurdish family, with his father a well-known businessman, and his grandfather the governor of the Central Bank of Iraq. But after Saddam Hussein came to …