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Evasion Strategies: Exploring Najib’s question evasion strategies in a news interview with Al Jazeera
Introduction
This paper attempts to examine the strategies Najib used to evade questions by Al Jazeera’s interviewer, Mary Ann Jolley. This interview is an Al Jazeera 101 East episode (Al Jazeera 2018). It took place after Ex-Prime Minister Najib and his political coalition lost the 2018 general election. In this interview, Najib and Mary discussed a few issues such as the 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) scandal and other issues connected to it, as well as the murder case of Altantuya Shaariibuu. After its broadcast, it got into the news due to its in-depth discussion of allegations against Najib as well as Najib’s failure in maintaining composure towards the end (The Star, 2018; New Straits Times, 2018; Malay Mail, 2018). In addition, at the Royal Television Society Television Awards 2019, the interview won the “Interview of the Year” award.
Literature review
1. News interviews and its conventions
News interviews employ a different form of speech exchange compared to normal conversations, and they are not considered as conversations but institutionalised talks (Matheson 2005). Heritage and Greatbatch (1991) also agreed with this as they stated that the system of turn-taking in institutional talks considerably diverges from the procedure of the turn-taking done in day-to-day conversations. Furthermore, according to Hutchby (2006), news interviews are considered as an instance of a formal institutional speech exchange system. The system adopts a straightforward question and answer sequences in terms of turn-taking. The interlocutors act according to their own interactional role, which in this case, the roles are the interviewer and interviewee. This speech exchange system, however, does not restrict the interlocutors to speak in this rigid manner, but they fulfil this speech exchange system due to their understanding of news interview conventions. Hence, they cooperate to construct this specialised feature of talk. If this convention was not fulfilled, the interviewee might get sanctioned by the interviewer.
Moreover, another convention adopted in news interviews is that the interviewer assumes this stance called neutralism. The term differs from neutrality, as it means being neutral in questioning the interviewees to obtain relevant information. According to Rendle-Short (2007), when interviewers display neutralism in news interviews, they assume a conventional role that has an objective stance and a balanced standpoint regarding issues of public concern and interest. They attribute it to other people or claim it that it is produced on behalf of others when they make statements or questions, thus distancing themselves. Interviewees also generally do not get affiliated or disaffiliated by their interviewers in the news interview form of institutionalised talk. Heritage and Greatbatch (1991) asserts that in news interviews, tokens of acknowledgement and news receipt objects are not employed by the interviewer when the interviewee speaks, but silently listens and fill in pauses with other questions.
Furthermore, although interviewers in news interviews are in a formally neutral position, they still seek to challenge their interviewees. Matheson (2005) states that challenges are common in news interviews. They are not considered as personal accusations, but a means to extract information from the interviewee on behalf of the general public as their representative. Challenges also happen when the interviewee does not, in the interviewer’s point of view, answer the questions given to them. Thus, interviewers may reassert the question to elicit information for the designated overhearing audience who views the news interview behind the screens. The overhearing audience helps to legitimise the interviewer’s more hostile, sensitive and intrusive questions or statements, allowing the interviewer lesser responsibility.
2. Politicians’ evasion in news interviews
Hutchby (2006) mentions that when politicians come for a news interview, they come to seek their personal interests. Additionally, in the event that the interviewer’s questions become potentially risky for the politician’s image, the politician would then attempt to employ evasion strategies by choosing the right words warily. Therefore, it becomes a popular notion that politicians are constantly evasive when they are questioned. Although, Clayman (2001) states that this urge to evade questions is due to journalism’s nature to pose questions that are hostile, incriminating and unflattering. Furthermore, if such questions were to be answered in a straightforward matter, the politicians risk their reputation, career prospects as well as the objectives of their policy. However, there is a disadvantage to being evasive. It is the politician’s obligation to answer the interviewer’s questions and their responses are more likely to be examined closely, so it can be disadvantageous if they attempt to evade questions.
Clayman (2001) also mentions that the interviewers keep in check for any evasive tendencies by the politician they are interviewing. When the politicians do get evasive and it is detected by the interviewer, the interviewer will sanction them and assert the question again or make more follow-up questions. Those sanctions and pressing for answers would then be more likely to become highlighted and exposed for the audience listening to the interview. One reason that interviewers, typically journalist interviewers, commit a more aggressive and assertive questioning is due to the contemporary journalism culture. They gain professional status from such practices.
Moreover, politicians’ act of evasion can become newsworthy and attract unwanted publicity (Hutchby, 2006). This also applies to the extremely overt act of evasiveness such as attempting to request to bring the interview to a close or walk out of the interview (Matheson 2005). This is the case of Najib in his interview with Mary Ann Jolley which this paper will examine.
Methodology
The following is a breakdown of steps to find out how Najib attempts to evade incriminating, hostile, and unflattering questions towards him; Firstly, I will use conversation analysis to transcribe the interaction between Najib and Mary Ann Jolley. This is because the conversation analysis method to transcribe talk is ideal as it can help examine institutionalised talk in a systematic manner and it can also examine the details of the interactions’ action on a turn-by-turn basis. Furthermore, the data has an affinity with conversation analysis as it is naturally occurring. Secondly, I will adopt Clayman’s (2001) framework of evasion to examine Najib’s strategies to evade risky questions. Thirdly, I will discuss the results of the analysis.
Clayman’s (2001) framework of evasion
The reason for adopting this approach is because it is able to answer the research question. In addition, the framework is preferable for analysing the selected transcriptions of Najib’s interview as it has clear-cut categorisations of overt and covert practices of evasion to shift agendas.
In practices of overt evasion, the interviewee chooses to be plain and straightforward in evading questions. Although it has a drawback as it might attract unwanted attention from the interviewer and the overhearing audience, it can be counterbalanced with the advantage of minimizing the risk of damage from admitting that evasion.
There are three forms of overt practices of evasion. The first category is token request for permission. It is a deference towards the interviewer as it asks for the interviewer’s permission to shift the agenda. This request for permission may not need a response from the interviewer, despite that, the interviewee acknowledges that the interviewer sets the agenda. The second category is minimizing the divergence. It is a practice that depicts the agenda shift as a trivial digression from the question’s framework by downplaying it. It often consists of minimising characterisations such as numerical and temporal minimisers, as well as adding the adverb “just”. The third category of overt practices is justifying the shift. The interviewee’s digression from a topic will have justifications and explanations for wanting to do so. They may be embedded in the interviewee’s requests and they also may be outside of the requests which would then be clearer and elaborate. The justifications would have this basis where the digressions are not for self-interest but for the need to answer some points that were raised as well as wanting to fulfil an implicit principle of fairness.
Aside from these three forms of overt practices of evasion, there is a special case worth mentioning, which is refusing to answer. The interviewee demonstrates an overt refusal to answer questions. When this takes place, justifications are very crucial. These justifications usually deflect away any responsibility from the interviewee and blame it on circumstantial factors. The interviewee might also state that the questions given to them were inappropriate and undeserving of any answers. There is also a rare case where the interviewee flatly refuses to answer a question without any justification, which can be seen as a highly hostile gesture, implicitly attacking the question’s validity.
In the practices of covert evasion, the interviewee attempts to avoid direct and obvious acknowledgement of the shifting in agenda. They may also attempt to obscure the shift. With sufficient subtlety, the agenda shift can be undetected by the interviewer and the overhearing audience. In addition, if it is noticed, it may be damaging to the interviewee, as they can be perceived as manipulative.
There are also three forms of covert practices of evasion. The first form is subversive word repeats. When the interviewee is asked a question, they can evade answering it in the exact framework while still staying on the subject. This is done by reiterating an important lexical item from the question and presents the response as if it is the answer to the question asked. Thus, the interviewee demonstrates themselves as being devoted to responding. The second form of covert practices is the usage of anaphoric pronouns. It is similar to subversive word repeats, but this form uses back-referencing statements to shift agendas. Both subversive word repeats and anaphoric pronouns can be used in combination. The third form of covert practices is operating the question. This is done by paraphrasing the question and changes it in a way that conceals any shift that has been done, which in turn allows the interviewee to alter their response to their benefit. Doing so makes the interviewee appear willing to give their answers.
Analysis
Excerpt 1:
Analysis of Excerpt 1:
In this excerpt, Mary asks Najib a question regarding his view of an allegation that claimed a letter from the Saudi prince was fake, and that is, in fact, a piece of writing used to cover up the diversion of 1MDB funds. In response to that question, Najib says “I want to say this” as the start of his answer. He employed an overt strategy by making a token request for permission from Mary to shift the agenda, to which he was allowed as Mary did not interrupt him. Hence, instead of answering the question, Najib moves on to explain that the reason that he accepted a huge a sum of money from a bank account in Saudi Arabia, was that he had an assurance from the Saudi King Abdullah that he would get the king’s support. Then, he continues to assert that because the initial donations came from Saudi’s Ministry of Finance, he assumed the subsequent donations would come from the same source. He also attempts to deflect responsibility from any connections with Jho Low. After that, he used another evasive strategy, which this time is a covert strategy that operates the question. He shifts the agenda by asserting that a more significant question would be whether he was informed of the source of the funds instead of asking for the truth to whether the fabricated letter was used to cover up the diversion of funds.
Excerpt 2:
Analysis of Excerpt 2:
The context of Mary’s question in this excerpt was that Najib’s stepson, a close friend of Jho Low, was alleged to have had two hundred million dollars of 1MDB funds transferred into his Singapore account, and went to purchase expensive properties with that money. He also used that money to fund the Wolf of Wall Street. Hence, she asks for Najib’s explanation for his stepson’s wealth despite only having a couple of jobs in banks. In response to this question, Najib answers “He’s always been a movie buff”. He attempts to evade the question by using the covert subversive word repeat, which is the word “movie”. He also uses an anaphoric pronoun “he”, a back-referencing statement which made it seem he was answering the question in the correct framework. He shifts the agenda by not answering the question, but he proceeds to disguise his comment as an answer which states the reason for his stepson for wanting to fund a movie.
However, his strategy failed as Mary detected his shift in agenda and attempted to interject. Najib, then, realises that his covert strategies failed so he tried to further evade the question, by adopting an overt strategy of minimising the divergence by using the word “just”, in response to Mary’s detection of Najib’s attempt to evade the question. It was probably used in hopes that Mary would be more forgiving and allow him to shift the agenda. Despite that, he failed again with his evasion strategy as Mary reformulates the question, seeking to extract information from Najib regarding his stepson’s source of huge sums of money.
Excerpt 3:
Analysis of Excerpt 3:
In this excerpt, Mary questions Najib whether he acknowledges the fact that his stepson was the beneficiary of the 1MDB funds. Based on how the question was formulated, it was to seek a yes or no answer from Najib. However, Najib did not give a yes-no answer to the question. He instead responds by saying his stepson had no knowledge that the money came from 1MDB, and if his stepson knew it was from 1MDB, he would not have accepted it. Najib used a subversive word repeat of “1MDB” and “settlement/settled”, as well as using the anaphoric pronoun “he” to make it seem he was answering the question.
Excerpt 4:
Analysis of Excerpt 4:
It is clear that based on this excerpt, the talk between Mary and Najib is quite problematic as it is full of overlaps. Other than that, it can be observed that Najib is adopting a very resisting stance. He overtly refuses the answer as he conveys that it is inappropriate to talk so much about the allegations against him. He also justifies on the principle of fairness that the subject of Malaysia’s economy should also be addressed. Although it may sound that it is part of a more extreme version of justifying the shift of agendas, it is not as it does not exhibit any deference to Mary. This evasion strategy is within the special case of refusing to answer as it deflects the responsibility away from Mary and places the blame that the talk of the economy was being neglected.
Discussion
Based on the analysis, it is found that Najib employs both overt and covert practices of evasion. In excerpt 1, he practised token request for permission (overt) and operates the question (covert). Moreover, in excerpt 2, he used a subversive word repeat and anaphoric pronouns (covert), as well as minimizing the divergence (overt). In the third excerpt, he also adopted subversive word repeats and anaphoric pronouns. The last excerpt was a special case where he overtly refuses to answer the questions given to him.
Due to his acts of evasiveness, he kept building on throughout that interview, he risked his reputation for being seemingly devious and manipulative in answering the questions given to him. His overt evasion practices were much more appropriate at the beginning of the interview, as seen in excerpt 1, because it showed deference to the interviewer and he was allowed to shift agendas. The covert evasive strategies that he employed, however, were not very effective. For instance, in excerpt 2, he was sanctioned by Mary for being evasive and he was questioned again. Thus, it may have had an impact on how the overhearing audience viewed him as he was exposed for being evasive in answering questions. In addition, in his special case of refusing to answer any more questions regarding his allegations in excerpt 4, it became very clear that Najib was adamant about wanting to shift agendas as he was losing his composure. This became one of the key instances that made the interview stand out to the overhearing audience from its overt evasive strategy and problematic exchanges as there were a lot of overlaps.
Conclusion
In conclusion, this paper has scrutinised Najib’s evasive strategies in his interview with Al Jazeera. He has employed both overt and covert strategies. However, the paper was not able to present all the strategies of evasion for this news interview as the data was very rich. Therefore, the researcher has chosen to analyse four excerpts on the more intriguing instances of evasion within the interview. Furthermore, Clayman’s (2001) framework alone may not identify all the evasion strategies used by Najib in the interview. A different approach to analyse this data may uncover more instances of evasion. This data may also be of use for other research frameworks such as examining the use of cooperation and politeness strategies.
References
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