One the mask. He is almost like a character in a pantomime the 1st expert witness is journalist Toby Young He's an associate editor of the right leaning Spectator magazine for stumps some was its editor in the mid 2000. But they go much further back to the 1980 s. When they were students at Oxford University Toby Young has known and observed Boris Johnson for over 30 years. In British history we have had these kind of stock characters on the national stage and Boris is a very recognizable archetype he is the kind of self-deprecating Penta mind solve it was at the Oxford Union the ancient debating society where want to be prime ministers hone their oratory skills where Toby Young 1st remembers watching this comedy tough perform he was making a case for the abolition of capital punishment only to catch him self after about a minute's start scratching his head and then look up in a slightly before the old way at the audience and say and on a 2nd we also motion is good and then I'm not against capital punishment so you then cross the floor and started making the argument for capital punishment it was brilliant the audience were in gales of laughter he had been eating out of his hand most of us would be desperately trying to play it by the book but there he was breaking every single rule 6. Toby Young says that students from well to do backgrounds tended to dial down their passion us it was a way of diffusing any hostility that their privilege might provoke but in Boris's case his way of defusing. That hostility was to turn the volume up to a level and become a kind of pastiche. The visual image is also carefully manicured he always wears these kind of robot ill fitting. Soups quite often one of his shirt tails is hanging out bars his tie is always kind of a bit askew he does look a bit like overgrown schoolboy and his trademark shaggy blond hair style not a hair in place. So was it all a performance to find out when and why Boris Johnson adopted this character we have to delve a little further back in his life his real name is Alexander Boris fretful Johnson. By all accounts he was a quiet shy young boy his nose often found between the covers of a book he want to scholarship to the famed English private school Eton a year later he learnt his parents were splitting up his mother spent 8 months in hospital with depression. It was at school his alter ego began to emerge Al was becoming Boris in a sense to people he's out to his family and close friends and to the outside world he's Boris. I don't know when and how the came Boris but I suspect it was at a very young age maybe when he 1st went off to school it was a form of armor a way of protecting himself to turn himself into this sort of comic character if he becomes prime minister will he discard the bumbling caricature in favor of a Polish statesman if it was once upon a. A mosque that he was able to put on and discard I think those days are gone it's a mosque that eaten into his face and he can't now take off However even before he's won the leadership election there are signs he's adapting his caricatural in preparation His hair is neater he's making fewer gags he's wearing a well tailored suit he's just well more serious this is the role he's been preparing for for the last 3540 years this is his time he's hand is almost no on the kind of steering wheel of history at a really critical moment in Britain's history I don't think he's going to mess it up I think he's going to seize seize the opportunity if that's how Boris wants his image to be what will he be like behind the scenes. Part 2 behind the mask. He was an officer to so we were working very long hours at the time it was joining the negotiations on the mastic Tracy and that's how I got to know him in. Our 2nd expert witnesses Boris Johnson's biographer Sagna pronoun they were together in the Daily Telegraph's Brussels bureau he doesn't really like working in team he's a really sort of solitary person likes to work only. He often locked the door to his office he didn't have introducing to anybody he was sort of in a way quite obstructive he certainly didn't want to collaboration stories or with contacts or ideas. Boris Johnson started out in journalism at the Times newspaper but he was sacked for making up quotes in Brussels he was taken on by a competitor paper. He has a knack of spotting a gap in the market and began churning out stories poking fun at the European Union and he rapidly became the European skeptic sweetheart. Snails of fish says. He never wrote stories that was an outright completely false as far as I know but what I did see was that he would take a germ of truth and then stretch it stretch it stretch it to a point where it kind of didn't really remember the truth any more Brussels recruits sniffers to ensure that you're a man you're smells the same threat to British pink sausages. On the B.B.C.'s Desert Island Discs Boris Johnson was asked about those stories it really I wrote from Brussels I thought I was going to I was just chucking these rocks over the garden like this and this in me using crash from a greenhouse next door over everything and as I wrote from Brussels we're having this amazing explosive effect and it really gave me this I suppose. Rather weird sense of power how will a man who has a taste for power a liking for solitude and a flexible relationship with the truth get along as prime minister. And then there's the question of his temperament he has something that became known as the 4 o'clock Grant and he himself has needed to listen how on one occasion he pressed so hard on a pirate that he drew blood from his palm and this was when he was keeping himself up to writing stories is a brilliantly crafted invectives if you like to get the European Union and he had to get himself into a certain sort of fired up state and it was an extraordinary thing I mean I was in the office next door I would have to put the phone down he would shout abuse as an innocent young plant on his desk. It wasn't only the Yucca plant that took the heat the episode I suppose the shocked me most was when Marina he just married her when she was heavily pregnant with their 1st child was in labor and called me in the office saying some distress she couldn't get hold of of Boris and would I try and find him Sonia did everything she could to find him she resorted to phoning the London desk at The Telegraph and also them if they knew where he was finally he was found the next time I saw him which is a day or 2 later I thought you know whose joyous news daughter being on is all wonderful I've never seen anyone more fear yes in my life to the point of it being really quite intimidating he was absolutely incandescent with me. It may have been because he's so sensitive about his private life that he flew off the handle but Sonya would never be sure because she never asked and never mentioned the incident again it wasn't something I that I felt able to raise ago. And or willing to raise again because I would do anything to avoid risking another outburst like that I don't ever see that again but that tendency to lose it to the point of being intimidating for no clear reason she says is a worrying trait for a future prime minister personally I've seen Boris Johnson have a bit of a hissy fit when I was following him on the campaign trail but then again many politicians can show a flash of anger or have a temper tantrum so no though has other misgivings about Boris Johnson suitability to be Prime Minister I think in many ways he's a workaholic my issue with him though all that workaholism. What's the end cause how does it benefit anyone ever except for some self so the idea of him becoming prime minister what for if Boris Johnson becomes the U.K.'s prime minister does he have a clear ideology. Part 3 all about me. I met portions in for a drink to ask his advice you know run through a few ideas I had There's one particular metaphor I was playing with about the Tory party that we discussed offered expert witness is the Times journalist Rachel Sylvester and then Sally to my surprise the next day he wrote the column that I had discussed with him using this metaphor which I'd thought spent ages thinking about the day before I was able to do it in my own column Rachel Sylvester says that Boris Johnson is an opportunist and she seemed that kind of behavior repeat itself on a larger scale it's career before principle can you talk me through one example of a policy that he has sort of slightly changed over time for whatever reason Immigration is a really good example because when he was London mare he was very liberal on immigration he talked a lot about his Turkish heritage have proud he was of that but then when it came to the e.u. Referendum he was joining the campaign that was very hostile to immigration and talked about Turks coming into the u.k. And it was using an issue really for his own purposes then again when he became foreign secretary he reportedly told a group of ambassadors that he was very pro free movement and very relaxed about it which wasn't government policy so I think probably it sounds like an instinct all quite liberal on it but he's not afraid or ashamed of putting on different ideological clothes when it suits the audience I'm not sure why he's in politics apart from the power so he famously said as a child his ambition was to become world king and his whole life has been on this trajectory of getting to number 10 Rachel Sylvester says. It's a worrying sign that when it comes to policy he flips and he flops with such ease and frequency and then those bricks it. Cannot be reported I like what they come out and say something in 2016 Britain was gearing up for the referendum asking whether the u.k. Should leave the European Union you might have thought that after all those stories he penned from Brussels Boris Johnson would know which side he was on but. I'm I built up a great deal of how to I don't think there's anything else I could do I would be advocating. Leave or whatever later it emerged that he'd written 2 articles before he made that announcement one supporting bricks it the other in favor of remain and he said he wanted to run through the arguments trying work out in his own mind which side he was on but actually it's such a defining issue and most people know instinctively which side they are arm and you just wonder was he really working out with a resume in favor of Bracks at all was he working out which was the best political position for him to take how would it work out than this this man who doesn't have the clear ideology or beliefs in his politics how does that play out do you think when he is actually or could become prime minister when he sees himself more as a sort of Chairman figure I think he's going to be setting the direction the public mood you know standing up for the nation abroad you know representing Britain in photo opportunities but the problem is if there's a vacuum at the top about the direction of government then that leaves space for all his cabinet ministers to try and fill that vacuum. So you can really see tensions developing between different departments in different ministers. If he does become prime minister Rachel Sylvester says he will already have one eye on his political legacy his political hero is Winston Churchill he wrote a biography of Churchill and he'd love to be seen as this great national wartime hero who saved the country restored national pride and he is facing another national crisis but the problem is not enough just to have hope for a good outcome he you have to actually deliver it to make decisions and Churchill did that and I'm not sure Boris Johnson has the same level of principles. In. Part 4. Of the people. Time far off final expert witness. Hello hello. Who has a lot more faith in the type of Prime Minister Boris Johnson would make. We catch our next expert witness on the Boris Johnson campaign trail by phone in the northwest of England it's a bit of a dodgy connection. I I don't know you weren't answering I thought that we had James cleverly is a current Breck said Minister but when Boris Johnson was mare of London he was one of the assembly members he can tell us about Boris Johnson the leader he was chatting with people in a community center and it was clear that he was just very comfortable during gauged and they were really really keen to chat with him but that was my 1st image of him when Boris Johnson won the London Merril election in 2008 it confounded some of his critics who did written him off as the joke candidate he proved them wrong therefore officially declare Boris Johnson to be elected as the next mayor of London. And I hope that everybody who loves this city will put aside party differences to join in the making of Greater London greater still let's get cracking tomorrow let's have a drink tonight but his opponent the outgoing mayor Labor's Ken Livingston hadn't underestimated him always makes people feel good about themselves it's incredibly powerful force that in politics not many people got that he therefore can get away with a lot and he was proved right Boris Johnson went on to win a 2nd term. So what was his leadership style the mayor's office had a big table it was around which the team sat and what Bob Morris who would do was he was his or the head of able or leaning back in his chair there'd be a tour of the room in terms of people expressing their views their opinions their ideas and he would often hear sit quietly listening it shows that Boris Johnson is willing to let staff take the lead when asked on the campaign trail what skills he had to lead the country he said he would govern the. As the head of a strong team that's his style which is to to trust the people his appointed to do the job that he's appointed them to. And you're not trying to micromanage but thank you very clear that he expects things to be delivered but critics say Boris Johnson's lack of attention to detail can have very serious consequences that was shown most clearly in 2017 when his foreign secretary he said that now as an inside Gary wracked with a British rainy and woman jailed in Tehran for alleged spying was teaching journalism her family have always insisted she was there on holiday visiting family his comments were seized on by the Iranians and 4 days later she was backing caught in Iran. Some commentators have speculated that Boris Johnson will rule like a cane and his cautious will vie for his attention but James cleverly sees it differently he's wrong likely to be more the captain of the rugby team actually on the pitch rather than just shouting orders from the from the sidelines. More 1st among equals rather than presidential. James cleverly says that his stint as London mayor has proved he has the credentials to be an effective leader when you are a leader whether it's at city hall or in number 10 you have to be willing to make decisions difficult decisions you work hard to make sure you make those decisions well and they're well implemented but I won't all be fantastic they won't all be brilliant but better to make decisions and actually the time that he was mayor of London the big decisions the big judgment calls in terms of delivering the Olympics in terms of cutting crime in terms of building houses the really big judgment calls he got those right. So what kind of Prime Minister will Boris Johnson be. His style will most likely be a mixture of all the versions we've heard about in this inquiry the comic caricature of the ruthless opportunist the good listener the team builder. But Hill most probably be preoccupied with working out how he can hold on to the crown that he spent his whole life fighting for. This edition of the enquiry was presented by Becky Milligan the producer was Sally Abrahams and the editor was Richard. You're listening to the b.b.c. World Service home of the world's news room I'm new McGovern presenter of b.b.c. O. S. Which comes to you live every weekday from our news room in London I'm surrounded by hundreds of journalists that are working on all different stories always various expertise in different parts of the globe and you can very much feel the energy particularly if a story is breaking interesting that it's been really a lot of coverage Greece has had been circulating I think the thing that is most shocking is when I suspect of the show that I feel is unique and probably contributes to a different sound is that you the listener is very much involved on him in the form of moderate people c o s My name is this is a meaningful connections very exciting to be at the heart of where news is breaking and developing b.b.c. Away at b.b.c. World Service dot com slash away. I had on the b.b.c. World Service at Boston calling with me Marco Werman In Nigeria it was legal to own a slave until 1916 and today the descendants of slaves still face discrimination it's clearly a taboo topic people ashamed of it it's something they hide now author Adobe Trishala Bonnie is writing about the descendants of Nigeria's slaves but it's not something people want to talk about they're people I've known all my life who I know a descendant of slaves and we've never discussed it on Boston calling after the news b.b.c. News with. The meter of Hong Kong has strongly condemned anti-government protesters for an attack on China's main representative office in the city county Lamb said the targeting of the office was a challenge to national sovereignty the Beijing government has also responded angrily at the same time over 40 anti-government protesters were injured by an unidentified gang who stormed a train station the party of the new anti-corruption Ukrainian president the former comedy actor and then ski is set for a decisive victory in parliamentary elections consolidating his political power the b.b.c. Correspondent in Kiev says that would be an astonishing achievement for a party that was only registered last year Iran says it has arrest is 17 spies who were working for the CIA and sentenced some of them to death intelligence ministries said the suspects have been collecting information in vital sectors including military and nuclear areas of activity voting is due to close later today in Britain and the Conservative Party leadership contest that will decide who becomes the country's next prime minister the results are due to be announced on Tuesday there are reports from Somalia of a car bomb exploding at her checkpoint near the airport in the capital Mogadishu a loud explosion was followed by gunfire. The president of the Philippines Rodriguez deter Tate is about to give his annual State of the Nation speech in which he's expected to stress that his controversial war on drugs is making people feel safer Israeli security forces have begun destroying homes in the Palestinian village of Seward by her close to Israel separation barrier Israel says the buildings pose a security risk and 4 people have been beaten to death in eastern India after being accused of practicing witchcraft and black magic the victims all aged between 60 and 65 were dragged from their homes by a mob of masked men b.b.c. News. Hello from Boston I'm Marco Werman and this is Boston calling from the b.b.c. It's a program as you know that puts a global perspective on the American experience great to be with you as always this week let's talk right now we're not even giving a fair chance for people to tell their stories it's clearly a taboo topic people ashamed of it it's something they hide it's a metaphor it's a very poetic metaphor it speaks to the heart at a certain point we just need to put it all out there on the table let's be blunt let's be direct and yeah let's talk about the legacy of slavery in Nigeria so called reeducation camps for wiggers in China and yes the immigration debate here in the u.s. That's where we'll start our program today there are