16 5 august 2019Boris Johnson
The One and Many
o pe n e s say
o finally it’s official. after weeks of public debate, and a great deal of public dismay, 55-year-old alexander
Boris de Pfeffel Johnson has won the contest for the leadership of the Conservative Party. Just under two-thirds of the
party’s members voted for him, and he now moves on to become Her Britannic Majesty’s new prime minister.
no great surprise, because internal polling suggested very early on that he would be the clear winner in the two-
horse race with Jeremy Hunt, the former foreign secretary.
Boris oozes confidence and charm, and has long been the darling of grassroots tories. they didn’t choose him for
his principles though, because he has never claimed to have any. His popularity rests on his proven ability to connect
with a live audience. He tells jokes and strives to entertain, which set him apart from all his main rivals—Jeremy Hunt, Michael Gove,
sajid Javid—who might have impeccable conservative credentials, but are strangers to the art of projecting warmth. and his skill as a
communicator is real. those who know him say that he is actually much more comfortable in front of a crowd than one-to-one.
Boris litters his speeches with references to the classical world he studied at oxford, and if he hesitates when looking for a word,
he is quite likely to come out with a well-turned latin phrase. Coupled with his crumpled appearance and eccentric speech pat-
terns, this gives him an air of mysterious intelligence which the party faithful lap up.
He is indubitably good with words, prima facie. He spent a long career as a journalist, and served six years as editor of the right-of-
centre Spectator magazine, though that stint also highlighted one of his recurrent vulnerabilities; his public pronouncements, both
oral and written, are a goldmine of gaffes. While at the Spectator, he had to apologise to the entire population of the city of liverpool
for making unkind comments about them. someone once observed that he was born with a silver foot in his mouth.
nevertheless, his literary and journalistic output is phenomenal, with a steady flow of political columns, two books on Rome,
one on the history of islam (his grandfather was a turkish Muslim immigrant), a collection of children’s poetry, an unadmired
novel and, most recently, a best-selling retrospective on his personal hero, sir Winston Churchill. Books come easily and quickly,
but Boris’ true talent is for provocative journalism. He doesn’t do boring, and no one really knows how that is going to play out in
Downing street. or Clowning street, as a hostile scottish newspaper has just re-christened it.
to his supporters, Boris seems ebullient and self-assured, with impeccable Eurosceptic credentials. they see him as the man to
galvanise his fractured party and to lead Britain out of its current, dismal political crisis. to his many detractors, however, he is the
embodiment of elite entitlement, an over-privileged product of Eton and oxford who has repeatedly failed to exhibit either moral
fibre, work ethic or basic competence in the jobs the public has bestowed on him.
for instance, his record as foreign secretary from 2016 to 2018 is decidedly patchy. it is not a job in which it is easy to shine, but
he managed to foul up on at least one important occasion, making a casual comment to a Parliamentary Committee that a British
citizen accused of anti-government activity in iran was in the country to train journalists. she was actually a charity worker on a
family holiday, and Johnson’s comments were used as evidence at her trial. the unfortunate nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe is still serv-
By ROdeRick MaTThews
A portrait of the new UK prime minister