A thorough analysis of our Deputy Prime Minister, Dato' Seri Dr. Ahmad Zahid Hamidi’s speech at the 71th sessions of the UN General Assembly

By Chong Beng Lim

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Recently, the conventional media, the Internet, and the social media have been abuzz with our Deputy Prime Minister, Mr Zahid’s speech at the UN General Assembly, in particular, his atrocious command of the English language. Some denounced him over his English. Some defended him over his English.

However, I beg to differ.

It’s not much about his lack of command of the English language, but rather, his overall delivery of his speech at the UN.

With some years of experience as a Toastmaster, let me evaluate his speech in a comprehensive manner so as to enlighten all the Malaysians that our DPM’s poor command of the language was not the sole culprit that contributed to his speech’s debacle at the UN.

I would evaluate his speech based on his language, delivery, and message.

My speech evaluation is based on the text of his speech published by New Straits Times and the video I downloaded (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=APzk6PGlcjA )from the UN website.

I would touch on the good parts, bad parts, and give some suggestions for improvement.

First and foremost, let me congratulate our Deputy Prime Minister, Dr Ahmad Zahid Hamidi on successfully making his maiden speech at the UN General Assembly. It is like being able to cross the finishing line of a marathon. Well done!

Let me comment on the positive parts of his speech.

First, he had a clear voice. Everybody was able to listen to his speech clearly.

There was some good use of the English language throughout his speech, below are some of the beautiful phrases and words: 

“runs parallel to; embraces; an overarching and guiding policy; catalyze; on that memorable day ; underprivileged communities; to further foster and develop a vibrant startup ecosystem in Malaysia and beyond; horrific acts of cruelty; a diverse cross-section of our population; the protracted crisis; perpetuate; winning the hearts and minds of religious leaders and women as well as our youths; the unrelenting expansion of illegal Israeli settlements; gross violations of human rights of Palestinians; continue unabated despite mounting international pressure and criticisms; Malaysia’s rapid and robust development and economic growth; heinous crime; grave injustice, expressing our profound gratitude.”

It's laudable that he was able to improvise his speech by saying "Malaysia has came out with this deradicalisation module and we stand ready to share our experience with other nations. We have prepared this SOP and to be shared with the whole nation in the group."

Very few leaders  at the UN General Assembly used a prop, however, our DPM managed to use the 'Deradicalisation SOP' book as a prop to grab the audience's attention.

What I like about his speech is that he mentioned the success rate of the deradicalisation and rehabilitation of terrorists in Malaysia was 97.5 percent. And Malaysia was willing to share its secret recipe with other countries in the world.

But I have a question to ask here: if Malaysia is so successful in deradicalising extremists, why don't the world of nations send their experts to learn from our country?

Now, I would like to touch on the negative parts of the speech.

It was the first time Dr Zahid had made his debut in speaking at the UN General Assembly. I could feel his nervousness and fear on the stage.

Both of his hands were clasping together, fidgeting with his fingers, a classic sign of nervousness of a neophyte speaker.

He was not comfortable with the speech and the audience, feeling like an ordeal or worse, 'a living hell'! He looked like he wanted to end his speech, or 'suffering' as soon as possible.

Perhaps, the speech had not been crafted by Dr Zahid himself. Or perhaps, he was not accustomed to reading from a teleprompter.

Thus, he only achieved a measure of eye contact with the audience.

Although his voice was loud and clear, it lacked vocal variety, draining the speech of its colours.

Our DPM started his speech slowly, a good start. However, as the speech wore on, his pace of speaking accelerated, probably caused by his anxiety on stage. As he got more nervous and uneasy, I couldn't detect any pauses in his speech. There was no way to let his messages sink in.

He stammered incessantly throughout his speech, repeating words or phrases two or three times. Sometimes, he twisted his tongue.

Words and phrases that he stuttered during the speech were: his Excellency; 70th session; SDGs; in the mean time; we must now; deradicalisation; the data requirement; by the occupying power; mounting; foreign.

I was amazed that our DPM couldn't even say the word 'SDGs' properly.

The word, 'deradicalisation', in particular, was excruciatingly difficult for Dr Zahid to pronounce. He twisted his tongue, grimacing while enunciating the word. I could see from his face. It was an agony.

Maybe pronouncing a 7-syllable word like 'deradicalisation' is a big ask for our DPM.

At times, he wrongly read the text. 'These programmes are complemented by various forms of humanitarian assistance.' was  read as 'these programmes has complemented by....'

'On good health' was misread as 'and good health'. 'They were influenced by the need to search' read as 'They are influenced by…'

And of course, he committed the infamous howler by saying Prime Minister Najib Razak as President Najib Razak.

He failed to enunciate the 's'  in certain plural words like 'seven decades'; 'conditions', 'greater employment opportunities' and a few more.

Also, there were quite a number of words he mispronounced: development, develop, overarching, youths, devastating, their, archaic, either, graduates, with, Palestinian, perpetuate, eradicate, and cognizant.

The word, 'develop', normally mispronounced by Malaysians, was read as " ‘devələp " instead of " dɪˈveləp ". In contrast, the Vietnamese Deputy Prime Minister, Pham Binh Minh, was able to pronounce the word 'develop' accurately. The Vietnamese DPM was also able to pronounce 'their' precisely as compared to our DPM.

Our DPM uttered the word, 'devastating' as  "diːˈvɑːsteɪtɪŋ " whereas the precise pronunciation is " ˈdevəsteɪtɪŋ ".

"Cognizant", was mispronounced as " kɒɡnɪˈsɑːnt ". The correct one is " ˈkɒɡnəz ə nt ". "With" was pronounced as "wis."

When our DPM had to ad lib and say, "Malaysia has came out with this deradicalisation module and we stand ready to share our experience with other nations. We have prepared this SOP and to be shared with the whole nation in the group."

There were two grammatical mistakes here. "Malaysia has came out" should be "Malaysia has come out". "..to be shared with the whole nation in the group" is better replaced with "...to be shared with all the nations in the group".

In the sentence, "They employ terror tactics and extremism as their approach and method in spreading their influence and reach." There are some elements of redundancy here as the words, "approach", and "method" are synonyms.

I find that there were too numerous long sentences employed in his speech. As a result it made the speech sound boring. The best is to pack one's speech with long and short sentences.

Now, let's talk about the content of his speech.

His speech swung like a yo-yo going from one topic to another, ranging from various Malaysia's initiatives that are in line with UN's SDGs, Magic, National Blue Ocean Strategy, HBB, climate change, terrorism, the suffering of the Palestinians, the settlement of refugees, migrants, forced labour to the selection of the next Secretary General of the UN.

There were too many mixed messages here and there. It was a meandering speech that lacked a coherent theme.

When I listened to President Obama’s speech at the UN, only one theme came to mind, “global integration.”

Even the speech of the Vietnamese Deputy Prime Minister, Pham Binh Minh, contained just three or four key messages, namely multilateralism, international law, peace, cooperation and development.

And the funny thing is that after espousing so many important issues, our DPM concluded his speech by stressing the essential traits of the next UN Secretary General. How bizarre!

In this age of the Internet and social media, I am astonished to learn that there was no mentioning of the roles of the Internet in influencing the world's current affairs in his speech. Hence, his speech was a trifle out of sync with the prevailing sentiments.

It was good to hear that "the success rate of the deradicalisation and rehabilitation of terrorists in Malaysia was 97.5 percent." But upon doing some research on deradicalisation, I found the following conclusion drawn from a Guardian article, "The problem, however, is that nobody knows if they (deradicalisation programmes) actually work."

Dr. Zahid said Malaysians no longer work in silos. But how come "RACISM" is still alive and kicking in Malaysia? Recently, my friend's children didn't want to attend school because they were being taunted by students from the other race, screaming obscenities like, "Cina B***." And the recent assaults on two Bersih supporters by the Red Shirts in Selangor say it all.

In conclusion, it's not much about his lack of command of the English language that contributed to his woeful performance on the international stage, but, rather, his lack of preparation that contributed to the calamity.

Years ago, I attended a design conference in Singapore. And there was a Japanese designer, who had barely spoken a word of English before the event, had taken his time to attend an intensive 3-month English lesson with an English teacher. The result: he was able to read his speech from a script written by himself, wow, amuse, engage, and entertain the audience.

Thus, poor grasp on English is not a good excuse for our DPM.

He should have practised it countless times before a mock audience, getting feedback from them. Then all the blunders could have been avoided.

I am quite positive that DPM didn't write the speech himself. It was written by someone whose level of English does not commensurate with his level of English.

If he found it chafing under the yoke of a teleprompter, then he should have emulated his foreign contemporary from Vietnam, Mr Pham Binh Minh, by reading the speech from a script.

Although there were a few stutters in Mr Pham Binh Minh's speech, at least he spoke with confidence and pride and his speech befits the speech of a statesman. Sadly, Dr Zahid's one doesn't.

Our DPM should ask around the proper pronunciation of each difficult English word he is not comfortable with whenever he's going to give a speech so that he can say each word with confidence. Good pronunciation is a critical currency for a speaker to impress the audience.

I was wondering whether he had a proper speech coach before his UN speech.

I would strongly recommend Dr Zahid to join the Toastmasters to hone his skills in public speaking.

By joining Toastmasters, he has to prepare ten project speeches that will greatly refine his speaking skills.

Let's examine whether his speech at the UN fits the requirements of the ten basic speeches in Toastmasters.

Speech 1: The Ice Breaker — The first speech of the Toastmasters program is about introducing yourself to your peers, providing a benchmark for your current skill level, and standing and speaking without falling over.

Speech 2: Organize Your Speech — Introduces the basic concepts of organizing a speech around a speech outline.

Speech 3: Get to the Point — Clearly state your speech goal, and make sure that every element of your speech focuses on that goal.

Speech 4: How to Say It — Examines word choice, sentence structure, and rhetorical devices.

Speech 5: Your Body Speaks — Shows how to complement words with posture, stance, gestures, facial expressions, and eye contact.

Speech 6: Vocal Variety — Guides you to add life to your voice with variations in pitch, pace, power, and pauses.

Speech 7: Research Your Topicm— Addresses the importance of backing up your arguments with evidence, and touches on the types of evidence to use.

Speech 8: Get Comfortable With Visual Aids — Examines the use of slides, transparencies, flip charts, whiteboards, or props.

Speech 9: Persuade With Power — Discusses audience analysis and the different forms of persuasion available to a speaker.

Speech 10: Inspire Your Audience — The last of ten speeches, this project challenges the speaker to draw all their skills together to deliver a powerful inspirational message.

Did he break the ice with the audience? Nope.

Was his speech organized?  All of you should have the answer now.

Did his speech get to the point? Sorry, no coherent theme.

Did his speech make use of good word choice, sentence structure, and rhetorical devices?

I would say his speech contains good word choice to a certain extent, but not commensurate with his level of English. The speech contains mostly long rambling sentences, employing almost no rhetorical devices.

Did Dr. Zahid show good body language? I think his body and hand gestures during his speech tell the whole story.

Did his speech possess vocal variety? My evaluation has given all the answers.

Did our DPM back up his arguments with evidence? I doubt it.

Was he comfortable with visual aids? Absolutely!

Did he persuade with power? A definite 'no'.

Did he manage to inspire the audience? His speech still left much to be desired. He needs to walk before he can run.

I am absolutely positive if Dr. Zahid is determined to improve his public speaking skills as well as his English in the future, we could see a reformed and improved Zahid on the international stage.

Where there's a will there's a way.