By Farooq Kperogi
I have said far more about Daniel Bwala’s sensational Al Jazeera rhetorical incineration than I am inclined to, and honestly wanted to move on, but his ludicrous, self-indicting post-interview ego defense has drawn me in again. I will isolate only the most egregious alibi he invoked to explain away what critics have described as his embarrassing lies, contradictions, inconsistencies, and lack of basic decency to admit the truth.
He says he should have been told in advance that his past criticisms of President Bola Tinubu would come up in the interview so he could “prepare himself.” That is a remarkable confession.
In journalism, interviews are not take-home exams where guests receive the questions beforehand, rehearse answers, and stroll in to recite them like memorized lines in a secondary school debate. If that were the standard, every interview would sound like a badly rehearsed stage play, or what my friend and former colleague Crispin Oduobuk used to call a “stand-and-deliver” performance.
The entire point of a personality interview is to test what a guest actually knows and believes when confronted with real questions.
What Bwala has accidentally revealed is far more interesting than his ego-defending, self-pitying lamentation. By complaining that he was not forewarned, he has essentially told the public that for all his appearances on Nigerian television, he always gets the questions ahead of time. In other words, the “analysis” viewers watch is often scripted, pre-packaged theatre.
That, the writer argues, is not journalism but public relations.
As previously noted in earlier reflections on journalism and political interviews, the role of journalists is often to push public figures with difficult questions in order to reveal unscripted reactions that may become newsworthy. According to this perspective, seasoned politicians understand this dynamic and respond to tough questions with composure rather than anger.
Such politicians, the argument goes, manage high-pressure or potentially embarrassing questions with humility and calmness rather than attempting to control the conditions of the interview.
The commentary suggests that a presidential spokesperson who presents himself as a public intellectual should understand that journalists do not typically provide interview questions in advance. It also notes that being unable to anticipate questions about one’s own past statements raises questions about preparation.
The writer likens the situation to a student protesting after failing an examination by claiming the lecturer never revealed the questions beforehand. In that analogy, the protest does not indict the lecturer but instead exposes the student’s lack of preparation.
According to the commentary, Bwala’s complaint effectively amounts to saying he failed the “exam” because he did not receive advance access to the questions.
The article also raises criticism about the spokesperson’s command of English during the interview, arguing that as a lawyer he should be comfortable with the language given that it is central to his profession.
Despite attempts to defend his performance after the interview, the writer concludes that the situation demonstrates what critics have argued all along: that he walked into the interview unprepared and that the questions simply performed their intended function.
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