Benjamin Zephaniah says Boris Johnson "may seem like a kind of buffoon", but is a "very, very dangerous person"; BBC Question Time, 12th October, 2012.
Benjamin Zephaniah nailed the myth of Boris the jester on Question Time last night, reeling off a list of his past outrages and saying the London Mayor “may seem like a kind of buffoon”, but is a “very, very dangerous person”.
Asked:
“Should Boris Johnson challenge David Cameron for the leadership of the Tory Party?”
He replied:
“Boris Johnson said that the Chinese have, think about it, you know, our relationship with the people abroad, he said ‘the Chinese have no culture’, this Asian culture, this culture that goes back thousands of years, and their culture is ‘based on copying Western culture’, he calls black people “picanninies”, he said that the problem with Africa is that ‘the British are not there’, he may seem like a kind of buffoon, a kind of clown, but he is a very, very dangerous person…
“In London there was a annual festival called Respect, which was bringing young people together, with music and poetry and everything else, one of the first things he did when he got into London, is stop it, he didn’t want to see that kind of unity, and you know I heard somebody in the Tory conference, a Tory supporter say something, that really I feel, I think is worth repeating, he said “could you trust Boris with his finger on the nuclear button?”.
“You know, it’s alright for a joke, but could you trust him with the lives of everybody in Western Europe? I think not.”
On Left Foot Forward this week, we’ve highlighted Boris Johnson’s record of failure in London – focusing on policing, here and here; and on housing, here and here – the more one actually looks at his record in office, and his string of offensive comments, the less funny he becomes.
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One Response to “Watch: Zephaniah on Boris: ‘He may seem like a buffoon, but he’s a very dangerous person’”
David Mullen
I’ve never thought Boris funny, and I have said to people that the clown demeanour is just a front for a malevolent side. However, Johnson is not the only one in the Conservative party that hold such views.