When Nigerian senator and business man, Ben Murray Bruce tweets, you get the impression that it’s a joke. Like no one, absolutely no one, should ever tweet like this.
We thought the Twitter account was a parody, but he has validated the account time and time again. So it’s okay, we have accepted him as our political cross.
But we needed to know if other countries had their own Ben Murray Bruces’. Surely, we cannot be the only ones who breed them. Seriously, I’m asking on behalf of Nigerians. Of course they do. Every single country has it’s own rich, rude and politically incorrect businessman/political figure.
And we found some of them:
Donald Trump – USA
Does he need any introduction? He’s running for President of the United States of America and his political career seems to combine three ugly things: the outsize role of money, the never-ending campaign season, and America’s embrace of reactionary celebrity figures. He frequently says things like:
Silvio Berlusconi – Italy
Berlusconi, like BMB, has an entrepreneurial spirit but is better known for his misdemeanors and ridiculous behavior.
One time, he hid behind a monument and jumped out to scare German leader, Angela Merkel, shouting, ‘Coo-coo!’. She enjoyed it, Berlusconi later said.
Clive Palmer – Australia
The similarities between him and BMB go beyond headlines and money, he also has grand plans.
While BMB has this:
Clive Palmer has plans to construct a replica of the Titanic. He wants to open his own ‘Jurassic Park.’ He has accused his political opponents of being funded by the CIA. He has called Chinese officials “mongrels” (and later apologized).
Vladimir Zhirinovsky – Russia
Vladimir Zhirinovsky, a loud-mouthed Russian politician, lacks the business credentials of BMB but his statements suggest that they are cut from the same cloth.
For example, he suggests arming every single person in Russia so they can kill birds. He threatened to carpet-bomb Poland and the Baltic states, he bullies female journalists (ordered his aides to “rape” the reporter, then told her that pregnant women shouldn’t be working) and he also rode a donkey in a 2012 election video.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oTyvTv4lsD4
Some comparisons may not be fair, their faults and virtues may be different from Ben Murray Bruce’s but they are definitely toeing the same line.
