On BBC World Service News this morning we heard that in Port
au Prince there are ‘Protests against long-delayed elections’. The identical
phrase was used again an hour later, so it wasn’t just a slip by a busy editor.
Now if, as seems reasonable, that means what it says, it’s
very odd: the people of Haiti don’t want elections? But nevertheless they are
displeased that elections are long-delayed? Well yes; I suppose if the unwanted
elections are inevitable, then best get them over with rather than put off the
evil moment.
Odder still, BBC News notwithstanding, I have heard from
other sources that in fact most of the people of Haiti are keen to have
elections, indeed that they have been protesting against the delays, not
against the elections.
Is it possible that that is actually what the BBC meant?
That is to say, something quite other than what it said? I might be thought to
have a bee in my bonnet about the Beeb, but when the writers of its
international news show themselves incapable of meaning what they say or saying
what they mean, it’s time they were replaced by people who know how to express a
meaning in good English.
'It must be true: I heard it on the BBC'.
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