OF CRISES AND WANING POLITICAL FORTUNES

Dear Editor

A sad reality of our modern existence is that we have an eve- present cliche regarding those in power being only concerned with optics in any situation. When good times roll, they want to be seen as the ones solely responsible for the whole effort. When bad times and worse still, crisis hit, they want to roll out the way, all the while artfully pointing their finger elsewhere. Indeed, it a mark of a true leader to maintain integrity during a crisis and assume responsibility for both success and failure. Harry S Truman, 33rd President of the United States was famously known to have a sign on his desk in the Oval Office that boldly proclaimed that ‘The BUCK STOPS here!’. Unfortunately, this does not seem to be a sentiment the inhabitants of Oval Office or indeed any major office of world leaders has carried forward into the 21st century. The ongoing pandemic has by most accounts, been an unprecedented disaster in terms of the global response. No one got it exactly right though some countries and leaders performed better than others. In Europe for instance, approval polls show a pattern that was at least initially quite similar. As the crisis got serious, approval ratings shot up as people rallied behind their leaders but as the crisis dragged on and the scenario became more dismal, the ratings started going down fast. Here lies the point where the patterns for the ratings diverged. Leaders like Angela Merkel swiftly recovered all lost ground by the strength and surety of their response, gaining the sort of approval ratings that would look good even in a non-crisis year. Leaders like Macron saw a modest comeback which acknowledged a sincere if lacking effort. Then there is the case of Boris Johnson. It would not be an exaggeration to say that Johnson is presently seeing something of a PR nightmare with his botched response to the crisis and poor handling of public criticism. On the very bottom end of this global spectrum are leaders like Trump and Bolsanoro who have picked a fight with their people, their cabinet, even the WHO to wriggle out of taking political responsibility for their poor handling of the crisis. In India, the Solicitor General has attempted to deflect criticism of government policy by calling such critics ‘vultures’. Regardless of how one views critics, it is clear that most leaders worldwide are in crisis mode to save their political fortunes and not the nations they are responsible for.

..... SAHIN UDDIN, MUMBAI via email