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Delhi's Chief Minister Made A Statement About Origins of COVID Variant & Sparked Controversy
Context
Delhi's chief minister tweeted a few days ago:
Chief Minister: New virus variant in Singapore being considered dangerous for kids.
This virus variant could cause third COVID wave in India.
I appeal to central government to ban flights to and from Singapore.
The chief minister is a local authority to the territory of Delhi.
Singapore's Ministry of Foreign Affairs was concerned about this tweet and called a meeting with the High Commissioner of India to Singapore, Mr Kumaran. The High Commissioner of Singapore to India then released a video on this matter:
This morning because of our concerns, my Ministry of Foreign Affairs has invited his Excellency High Commissioner Kumaran (High Commissioner of India t0 Singapore) to come to MFA to have a meeting to really express our deep concern that the very prominent political figure in Delhi had failed to ascertain facts before making those claims and those assertions.
Following that meeting, we would have noticed already MEA's spokeperson put out a tweet to say that the High Commissioner Kumaran has during in the meeting clarified several things. And the most important being the Delhi Chief Minister has no competence to pronounce on a COVID variant or on the civil aviation policy.
Following Dr Jaishankar's tweet, my foreign minister also re-tweeted to thank Dr Jaishankar on his 3 points made. And basically that both sides should focus on the task ahead at hand which is to fight COVID. And that we will continue to help each other out while we are fighting COVID within our own countries. So with the exchanges between the two, my foreign minister and the external minister here, I would say that I wish to put an end to this episode because the authorities representing the government of India have spoken and that we are heartened by those clarifications and those assurances. And we feel that we should move on with the task ahead.
Then, the Joint Secretary at Ministry of External Affairs, India, Arindam Bagchi tweeted that
Singapore Government called in our High Commissioner today to convey strong objection to Delhi CM's tweet on "Singapore variant".
High Commissioner clarified that Delhi CM had no competence to pronounce on COVID variants or civil aviation policy.
Following that, the current Minister of External Affairs of the Government of India, Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, replied to this tweet:
Jaishankar: Singapore and India have been solid partners in the fight against COVID-19.
Appreciate Singapore's role as a logistics hub and oxygen supplier.
Their gesture of deploying military aircraft to help us speaks of our exceptional relationship.
Jaishankar's second tweet in response to his own first tweet:
Jaishankar: However, irresponsible comments from those who should know better can damage long-standing partnerships.
So, let me clarify- Delhi CM does not speak for India.
A full video of the incident is here:
Power Dynamics Analysis
I think this is a very interesting case because of
- Authority power dynamics
- Frame control: implied frames, covert frames
- Competitive Vs Collaborative Frames
Should Politicians Release Statements on the Twitter Medium?
I believe that politicians should refrain from releasing essential statements on Twitter.
Due to the character limit, it is challenging to convey an important topic on this social media channel.
The release of an important statement should be well-managed too.
Maybe holding a press conference would be better because it allows the public to clarify doubts on the expectations conveyed by the authorities.
Bringing the discussion on Twitter was also a huge mistake.
There was another discussion on Modi's tweet:
Use positive sentences: people focus on keywords, not whole sentences (Modi example)
First Tweet by Chief Minister
Chief Minister: New virus variant in Singapore being considered dangerous for kids.
This virus variant could cause third COVID wave in India.
I appeal to central government to ban flights to and from Singapore.
From the news on COVID, the Singapore government probably prides itself on handling the COVID situation very well.
And this forms part of the international image of the country and the government.
Recently, Singapore ranked as the safest country to live in during this COVID pandemic.
What the above statement implies by stating a new virus variant found in Singapore is
Singapore probably has quite a lot of cases and has produced a new variant of the virus.
And that this is serious enough to warrant concern on a third wave in India.
As such, India should ban flights to and from Singapore.
However, the strain, B16172, actually originated from out of Singapore.
Furthermore, flights between India and Singapore have already been limited.
As such, the Singapore government would naturally be taken aback by such a comment.
To a large extent, Singapore survives through the strength of its diplomatic ties as it cannot reply on its own internal resources.
This implies the country's international reputation is important including how it has been handling COVID.
First Reply by Singapore High CommissionerÂ
The main problem here is that the Joint Secretary at the Ministry of External Affairs, India did not extract out the Singapore High Commissioner's message in the best manner.
Joint Secretary at the Ministry of External Affairs, India
Singapore Government called in our High Commissioner today to convey strong objection to Delhi CM's tweet on "Singapore variant".
High Commissioner clarified that Delhi CM had no competence to pronounce on COVID variants or civil aviation policy.
This changed the tone from clarification and discussion of Singapore's Foreign Ministry with India's High Commission to a strong objection and framing Delhi's Chief Minister as having no competence. When the matter was actually discussed on both sides to reach the conclusion.
Essentially, the original message was to throw Delhi's Chief Minister under the bus for the statement and frame the relationship as collaborative by saying that we will continue to work with each other throughout this COVID pandemic.
However, the Twitter message released by the joint secretary of India reframed this in a way that seemed defensive and retaliatory.
As such, this escalated the situation because some people were not pleased with this misunderstood tone.
Tweets from Minister of External Affairs of the Government of India, Subrahmanyam Jaishankar
The first tweet was good because it sets up a collaborative frame between India and Singapore against the bigger enemy of COVID.
Giving credit and speaking highly of Singapore's reputation was a good move too.
Jaishankar: Singapore and India have been solid partners in the fight against COVID-19.
Appreciate Singapore's role as a logistics hub and oxygen supplier.
Their gesture of deploying military aircraft to help us speaks of our exceptional relationship.
However, I believe the second tweet was not ideal:
Jaishankar: However, irresponsible comments from those who should know better can damage long-standing partnerships.
So, let me clarify- Delhi CM does not speak for India.
Delhi is one of the most important territories in India.
The above statement highlighted that India's central government is not in harmony with the Delhi state.
This is never good in any organisation.
People will start to think
If Delhi CM does not speak for India, why is he held in such a prominent position in one of the most important territories in India?
Some Indians even thought that it was a political opportunity for the central government to social climb on and attack at the mistake of Delhi's chief minister.
Understandably, people are angry that the government could be playing politics rather than focusing on resolving the COVID situation for the people.
Twitter has an inherent character limit so it may be challenging to communicate the right tone.
Instead, he could have released a video and included a message like the following:
Jaishankar: Singapore and India have been solid partners in the fight against COVID-19.
The statement by Delhi's Chief Minister was a mistake. (Necessary to acknowledge mistake and even throw someone under the bus at times)
However, this mistake does not represent the strong, long-standing relationship between Singapore and India. (Highlight that we can close this chapter and carry on the otherwise strong, collaborative relationship)
Appreciate Singapore's role as a logistics hub and oxygen supplier.
Their gesture of deploying military aircraft to help us speaks of our exceptional relationship.
Singapore and India will continue to work together to fight COVID-19.Despite this mistake, our central government will continue working with Delhi's local authority to alleviate the COVID situation in Delhi. (show that despite this mistake, the government can show a united front in this tough period to battle COVID-19 for the people. After all, people want to know that their leaders genuinely care for them especially during tough times)
Very good analysis, Matthew.
Personally, I might have rephrased this one:
"The statement by Delhi's Chief Minister was a mistake"
Into this:
"We know now that the statement by Delhi's Chief Minister was not (medically) correct"
Sounds more "definitive", and less of a political attack/vendetta.
Or even better, I might have even glossed over on what Delhi's CM and simply stated what was the correct medical authority position on the matter, then re-state the good standing of Singapore.
I do see when it comes to correcting someone or a piece of information, it's best to sound definitive and that you are after the truth.
Also, give fewer opinions and state more facts.
In this case, "facts" could mean what is aligned with the domain authority like WHO for COVID.
Based on Lucio's advice, I'm thinking that this could be modified to
Jaishankar: Singapore and India have been solid partners in the fight against COVID-19.
We would like to state that the new variant is the B16172 strain of COVID.
Where this strain originates from is debatable.
All we know is that there is a double mutation from the original COVID strain.It is important for us to stay united against the fight of COVID.
Our central government will continue working with Delhi's local authority to alleviate the COVID situation in Delhi.Appreciate Singapore's role as a logistics hub and oxygen supplier.
Their gesture of deploying military aircraft to help us speaks of our exceptional relationship.
Singapore and India will continue to work together to fight COVID-19.
This will put everyone back on the same page of focusing on fighting the COVID situation.
To prevent such future mishappenings from happening, the government can host an internal meeting to discuss the importance of fact-checking and how to release information.
Yeah, I personally like this edit more.
As a rule of thumb, "do your wrist-slapping in private, and then be more conciliatory in public".
Exceptions apply and sometimes you want to make it public to send a strong message, but better to talk behind the scenes as well so you don't take the whole fight in public.
And especially when you the power and authority to put an end to flames, do so and go back focusing on the value-adding efforts.
A public and neutral message like that already sends a powerful message anyway: we do not stand behind the Delhi guy, he went rogue and made a mockery of himself.
