Over the last few days, Presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, has come under criticism over what his critics described as a gaffe, during his speech at the Kaduna State Investment Summit 7.0.
The presidential hopeful had while eulogising Kaduna governor, Nasir el-Rufai, praised his ingenuity for “turning a rotten situation into a bad one.”
As typical in a political season, where everything you say can be used against you, the opposition latched onto and have been feasting on the comment which was an obvious slip of the tongue.
Did Tinubu really commit a gaffe in the strict sense of it? Was it anything in the mould of the Kinsley gaffe?
Named after journalist, Michael Kinsley who popularised it, a Kinsley gaffe occurs when a political gaffe reveals some truth that a politician did not intend to admit.
“A gaffe is when a politician tells the truth – some obvious truth he isn’t supposed to say.”
Kinsley himself posed the question: “Why should something a politician says by accident automatically be taken as a better sign of his or her real thinking than something he or she says on purpose?”
Steven Pinker it was, who also said that politicians use vague and indirect language to avoid making concrete statements, and that lazy journalists base political coverage around “gaffe spotting” rather than analysis of political platforms.
With the internet now, a slip by a politician can be used as a subject of negative campaigning, and that is what is happening in the case of Tinubu.
Otherwise, how could anyone believe that within the context of the event, which was attracting investment and raising internally revenue, the el-Rufai administration turned a rotten situation into a bad one?
Kaduna state according to the governor has attracted a total investment portfolio of $4,488,000,000, comprising actualised and announced investments, and has created 75,750 direct and indirect jobs in the last seven years.
In 2021 alone, the state raked in N52.9 billion as Internally Generated Revenue (IGR), a marked improvement from the N11 billion it was in 2015 when the incumbent governor assumed office.
To put the matter to rest, media handlers of Tinubu already issued a statement explaining that, “it was a slip of tongue that is common to every human being and even great leaders. The APC leader inadvertently said Governor El-Rufai “turned a rotten situation” he met on ground in Kaduna into “a bad one” whereas he meant to say “to a great one to be proud of today. It was a mere Freudian slip that is not unusual in life, even among leaders of nations. We recognise we are in political season where everything is latched on for deliberate distortion and twisted mischief.”
Indeed as the Tinubu camp said, slips are common even among world leaders.
Politicians may have different ideologies, depending on the political divide they belong but one thing they have in common is slips, sometimes Freudian and none is immune to them.
Speaker of the US House, Nancy Pelosi, was widely criticised for thanking George Floyd, who was murdered by a white cop for “sacrificing your life for justice.”
Criticism trailed her comment and Huffington Post editor Philip Lewis summed it up by saying “Nancy Pelosi thanks George Floyd for being murdered.”
A new House Member, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., displayed a lack of geographical knowledge when she touted her patriotism by stating that American dollars should be spent on the U.S., not other countries. She listed Guam as one of such countries but unknown to her, Guam is one of the territories of the US since 1950.
US president, Joe Biden, has had one too many of such slips. From wrongly reading teleprompters to always telling reporters his staff will be upset with him for answering their questions, slips are not new to him.
The same people who are always quick to compare Nigeria with “saner climes” will, however, have Tinubu’s head for saying he was advised to stay on the script.
Was it not former British Prime Minister, David Cameron that was captured on camera telling the late Queen Elizabeth that Nigeria and Afghanistan were fantastically corrupt?
President Barack Obama and his then French counterpart, Nicolas Sarkozy, were also caught in a ‘gossip’ session at the G20 summit in 2011, discussing former Isreali Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu.
Sarkozy reportedly told Obama: “I can’t stand him. He’s a liar,” to which Obama is reported to have replied: “You’re tired of him; what about me? I have to deal with him every day.
Obama had also in criticising musician, Kanye West, over his action at an MTV Video Music Awards event, described him as a “jackass,” during an off-the-record portion of a TV interview.
In 1988, while trying to quote John Adams who said “Facts are stubborn things,” former US president, Ronald Reagan slipped and said, “Facts are stupid things.”
Former Texas House Speaker Gib Lewis had quite a number of famous bloopers. While closing a congressional session, what was reported in the media as Lewis’s real feelings about his peers slipped out when he said, “I want to thank each and every one of you for having extinguished yourselves this session.”
Lewis also tried to explain his problems once by saying, “There’s a lot of uncertainty that’s not clear in my mind,” and at another time while describing his reign as speaker, said “This is unparalysed in the state’s history.”
One time US vice president, Dan Quayle was the king of malapropos and his slips of the tongue made him an easy target for late-night talk shows. One of his most famous blunders came in 1992 when, at an elementary school spelling bee in New Jersey, he corrected student William Figueroa’s correct spelling of potato as p-o-t-a-t-o-e.
Another US vice president, Spiro Theodore Agnew, before resigning, following evidence of tax evasion, in what appeared to be an expression of his true feelings on the matter had said “I apologise for lying to you. I promise I won’t deceive you except in matters of this sort.”
President George W. Bush said in a 1994 interview, while reflecting about growing up in Midland, Texas, said “It was just inebriating what Midland was all about then.” He probably had meant invigorating.
President George H. W. Bush also had his fair share of bloopers. While campaigning in 1988, Bush described serving as Ronald Reagan’s vice president this way: “For seven and a half years I’ve worked alongside President Reagan. We’ve had triumphs. Made some mistakes. We’ve had some sex . . . uh . . . setbacks.”
The way I see it, bloopers are bloopers, they happen to the best of humans and that’s just about it.
