Is Partygate Boris Johnson’s One-Way Ticket to the Political Graveyard?

It’s been nothing short of a grueling week for British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who’s facing an onslaught of public condemnation after several explosive reports exposed his government for hosting clandestine parties during lockdown, COVID be damned.

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But will the controversy, aptly dubbed “partygate” by the English press, be the political nail in the coffin for the scandal-plagued prime minister?

“The idea that he’s saying something with an apparently straight face, which every single person knows is not true, is really damaging,” said The Daily Beast’s Nico Hines on Friday’s The World This Week. “People in Britain have a certain respect for a scalawag chancer, someone who doesn’t really play by the rules… But what they’re finding out now is that he’s laughing at them, and nobody likes to be laughed at or lied to to their face. He’s really got himself on the wrong side of the argument this time.”

AFP’s Dave Clark pointed to one sure-fire sign Johnson may be inching toward his political grave: the fact that the most recent revelations were reported by a publication that has been historically friendly toward the prime minister.

“The last three stories that came out were from The Daily Telegraph, which is the newspaper that Boris Johnson himself used to work for,” said Clark. “I think something has changed in the past few days... The British elite senses that there’s blood in the water and it’s time for something new.”

Watch the full The World This Week episode on France 24.

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