Prince Phillip Mountbatten, 1921-2021.
A lifetime of privilege, gaffes and political incorrectness.
Tributes have been paid, from all over the world to the late Duke of Edinburgh, Prince Phillip Mountbatten, who passed away yesterday, aged 99. For those of us, who have been accustomed to his presence, all these years, we now speak of him in the past tense.
As is the case with international relations, where skillful diplomacy is the order of the day, these tributes, more often than not, tend to be dominated by anodyne statements and useless platitudes. As a point of reference, check out Barack Obama’s trending statement on this platform.
The Duke of Edinburgh, himself, was such a gift to the press pack, not because he was irascible from years of walking behind his wife, or at times cantankerous, but because he was so unpredictable and it was near impossible to know what was going to come out of his mouth and who would be the object of his insults.
What’s extraordinary here was that, he knew what he was doing — insulting people of colour, in Britain and in the wider commonwealth. And that by virtue of his position as her majesty’s husband, he would never be called upon to apologize for what should be seen as rabidly racist and bigoted comments.