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Ireland's political and cultural magazine
May 2015 9
Villager
Border Fox
The Facebook site of ‘Dessie O’Hare Crafts’
fronted by ‘Dessie from Keady who
attended St Patrick’s High School’ sells
innocuous republican memorabilia: glass
Easter lilies and the like. But have no doubt
it is the Border Fox gone retail. In October
, O’Hare and his IRA gang killed Mar-
garet Ann Hearst, a female part-time
member of the UDR, in front of her three-
year-old daughter, in Armagh. In
O’Hare was shot twice and arrested after a
car chase through County Monaghan
ended when O’Hare crashed his car
through a herd of cattle into a farmer’s car,
before coming to rest in a field. He broke
both ankles in the crash but his companion
in the car was not so lucky and died. In
he led an Irish National Liberation
Army offshoot gang which had intended to
seize Austin Darragh, moneybags owner of
the Institute of Clinical Pharmacology, in
Dublin but Darragh had moved out three
years before and it was occupied by unfor-
tunate dentist, John O’Grady, his
son-in-law. O’Grady was kidnapped and
initially held in a Dublin basement before
being moved to Cork, where he was held in
a cargo container. After ransom demands
were not met O’Hare cut off the little finger
from each of O’Grady’s hands with a
hammer and chisel and sent them to
Carlow Cathedral (as you did in the s).
In a telephone call to the Gardaí O’Hare
stated: “It’s just cost John two of his fin-
gers. Now I’m going to chop him into bits
and pieces and send fresh lumps of him
every fucking day if I don’t get my money
fast”. O’Hare became the most wanted man
in Ireland with the Gardaí offering a
£, reward for information on his
whereabouts. He surfaced in County Louth,
where he allegedly fired shots into a takea-
way during an altercation with his wife. In
late November O’Hare was arrested and
shot eight times during a fire-fight, in
which his companion was killed. An Irish
Army soldier was wounded in the affray.
He received a -year sentence but was
finally released in and the PSNI has
said it will not pursue him for the cases
of unsolved killings in which he was under
suspicion. Through imprisonment he devel-
oped an identification with the plight of the
disabled and participated in fund-raising
events for them, though he says he has no
regrets. Sure why would he?
Borderline Dog
A rat the size of a dog has been found swim-
ming in a Tipperary Irish river – and now
wants a good home.
Three-foot long Rodney, a coypu Ameri-
can swamp rat native only to South
America, is three times the size of the aver-
age Irish rodent though around half the
size of the average local politician. He’s now
being cared for at the Kildare Animal Foun-
dation Wildlife Unit which told RTÉ Radio
One’s ‘John Murray Show’: “He’s not just an
ordinary Irish rat, there’s no fear there’ll be
an epidemic”. The search is now on to find a
home for the furry creature with a spokes-
man adding: “He doesn’t have any fear in
him so we think he must have been a pet”.
He’s not then related to another rat,
-inch long and native, which came to the
attention of Dubliner homeowner Grace
Walters last year after she heard loud
scratching sounds coming from over her
ceiling.
Borderline Dogmeat
McDonalds shares sagged after they
recently announced a new Plan to replace
the general tactic for the last decade of cov-
ering the plastic in stuff that looks like
wood. But guess what: a leadership
reorganisation won’t do it. Investors (a
surrogate for only slightly more interesting
customers) believe it’s got too many items
on its menu – new ones, and it should
use apps more. Sounds a bit like Village.
Straw man Iona-institutionalised
Villager is % behind Gay Marriage. But
jaysus has the media and political coverage
been biased towards the Yes vote. Villager
particularly recoiled from the piece by the
Irish Times’ increasingly unreadable Jenni-
fer O’Connell who joins us photogenically
from San Francisco whence she sparks
rueful envy in the gut of bemired middle
Ireland. “Gay Marriage causes abortion?
Now I’ve heard it all”, blasted her headline
in what was essentially ‘straw man’ argu-
mentation. Because if the views of the
minority of loonies on the Yes side were
subjected to analysis in this way liberals
would be incandescent. Nobody’s making
these arguments Villager murmured heter-
osexually to himself. Then his attention
was drawn to the Iona Institute’s David
Quinn who recently made just this connec-
tion. He told a room of supporters that “if
we lose the [gay marriage referendum]
badly, I think they will have an abortion
referendum in . If we keep this close,
or we manage to win, it’ll frighten them off
share-price
down again
an abortion referendum for years to come.
So I think, actually, this is connected to
protecting the th amendment of the con-
stitution which is a pro-life amendment”.
Riddle me this, Enda
The Greens’ somewhat painful leader in
Britain, New Zealander Natalie Bennett,
highlights, by contrast, what effective com-
municators the leaders of Ireland’s Greens
were during their last period in the sun.
Most famous for having cascaded into a
bundle of inarticulate sniffles on the air-
waves earlier in the year, Bennett has
recently said she is ‘open’ to considering
polyamorous marriages. These used to be
known as polygamous and were not
regarded as progressive – though admit-
tedly the model was patriarchal, and there
is now a matriarchal variation. Speaking in
a question-and-answer session with
PinkNews, Ms Bennett was reacting to a
reader who asked: “As someone living with
his two boyfriends in a stable long-term
relationship, I would like to know what
your stance is on polyamory rights. Is there
room for Green support on group civil part-
nerships or marriages?”. Lib Dem
Parliamentary candidate Zoe O’Connell
recently opened up about living in a
polyamorous relationships with her part-
ners. Natalie Bennett’s partner Jim Jepps
came under scrutiny earlier this month for
a blog about rape fantasies.
Villager just doesn’t know what the
answer is to the reader’s question. Or even
really what the question is, or should be.
Rushing to judgement
Following the fall of the Soviet Union in
, Russia liberalised some of its anti-
LGBT laws. Most notably, homosexual
relationships, which had been decriminal-
ised between and were again
legally permitted after . However,
there are currently no laws prohibiting
discrimination regarding gender identity
or expression and recent laws could dis-
criminate against transgender people. In
recent years, Russian authorities have rou-
tinely denied permits for Pride parades,
intimidated and arrested LGBT activists
and condoned anti-LGBT statements by
government officials. ILGA-Europe rates
Russia as the least protective of the
countries in Europe for LGBT. In June ,
the Russian Duma passed a new law ban-
ning the “propaganda of non-traditional
sexual relationships” to minors. Putin said
gay people would not be harassed as long as
they “leave children alone”. But then,
unlike – so the editor asserts – in the Vil-
lage, in Russia inequality is not much of a
thing. Wealth inequality is perhaps the
worst in the world. A report from Credit
Suisse found that just Russian citizens
hold % of the nation’s household wealth.
Of course its economy’s collapsing too, as
oil prices fall and the currency tumbles in
face of sanctions against its wars in
Ukraine.
And it’s disastrous ecologically too: oil,
gas and coal produce % of the country’s
energy, they are also responsible for more
than half of the federal government’s
budget. Inevitably Putin has a view that
“two or three degrees” of warming could be
good for Russia because residents wouldn’t
need to spend as much on fur coats. It
reminds Villager of Ireland’s own macho
environmental decision-maker Alan Kelly.
Can it be long before the saviour of the
Labour party goes shirtless hunting?
Ourselves
Sinn Féin has defended a leaflet it is distrib-
uting in North Belfast which describes the
religious breakdown of a constituency for
the Westminster elections. The leaflet, pub-
lished by the party’s MLA, Gerry Kelly,
contains figures from the census
showing that there are now more Catholics
than Protestants in North Belfast and urges
people to ‘Make the Change, Make History’.
It notes there is now “a majority of ,
nationalists” in the constituency, citing the
figures, and urges voters to elect
Kelly to “defend all citizens against auster-
ity, sectarianism and the failed politics of
the past”. Though not obviously against
threats to their failed Unionism.
Memories of goldsh
Just a year since you and I were convulsed in
righteous fury and six months since donors
pledged $.bn towards Gaza’s recovery,
many people are worse off and not a single
one of the , destroyed homes has
been rebuilt. , people are still
homeless and many are living in makeshift
camps or schools. Oxfam International
claims that, at the current rate, rebuilding
of Gaza’s housing, education, and health
infrastructure “could take more than
years to complete”. The delay, as Oxfam
notes, is due to the Israeli blockade, which
is now in its eighth year; it is preventing the
essential building materials from entering
the strip. While , truckloads of con-
struction material are needed, only ,
have been allowed in since last October’s
international conference in Cairo. Under a
mechanism agreed between Israel, the Pal-
estinian Authority and the United Nations
after the war, damaged homes are assessed
by the UN and lists of supplies are provided
to the Israeli military for clearance.
Since the temporary ceasefire, violence
against civilians has continued, with more
NEWS Villager
Sunny
Natalie
Bennett
10May 2015
May 2015 11
than incidents of Israeli fire into Gaza
and four rockets fired from Gaza into Israel.
The Left-wing group Breaking the Silence
has just accused the Israeli Defence Forces
of indiscriminate fire at Palestinians during
the war, a practice which it said was con-
trary to the army’s past policy of minimal
force, for example in the Gaza con-
flict. To support its claims the group
compiled testimonies from Israeli sol-
diers who fought Hamas during Operation
Protective Edge.
Self-serve
Walter Hobbs, a consultant who was
brought in by IBRC to assess Denis O’Brien’s
lowish bid for Siteserv, is managing direc-
tor of ACT which owns stakes in startup
companies Swrve [sic], Firecomms and Bio-
sensia. So does a company called Atlantic
Bridge. One of its major investors is Denis
O’Brien.
Meanwhile Alan Dukes quietly raised an
important issue which the lugubrious body
politic has not properly registered. It is not
clear if the proposed inquiry with KPMG
bods supervised by retired judge Iarlaith
O’Neill into transactions involving IBRC in
capital losses of at least €m compre-
hends that the loss be measured against the
original face value of the loan or against the
written down value of the loan after the
bank’s provision for impaired loans. In gen-
eral Villager is very worried for poor Davy
and KPMG that they haven’t realised the
consequences of conflicts of interest but
sure KPMG will get to the bottom of them.
Davious
Davy is Ireland’s biggest stockbroker. It was
founded in on Dublin’s Westmoreland
Street and moved in the s to the
former Hibernian Hotel site on Dawson.
Having, as you might wish, been multiply
bought and sold, it now is owned by staff
and management. In addition to having a
finger in every significant pie in tiny Ire-
land it has an invidious history.
The Planning Tribunal established that,
throughout the s and s, it was
making payments to the corrupt politician
Liam Lawlor.
In , Davy made a political donation
of £, to Bertie Ahern, which holed up
in his personal account at Irish Life &
Permanent.
The next year the firm was the subject of
an Irish Stock Exchange inquiry over the
abortive placement of the government’s
stake in Greencore plc, the recently priva-
tised former Irish Sugar Company. The then
Taoiseach, Albert Reynolds for once let
loose: “you employ professional people to
do the job...it was not done in a professional
manner”. The managing partner, Brian
Davy, resigned.
In then CEO Kyran McLaughlin too
resigned after his wife revealed documen-
tation in his name indicating how to set up
an impossible trust in Liechtenstein and a
“Note to John Furze” (the man who ran the
Ansbacher deposits in the Cayman Islands),
to the Moriarty Tribunal. He later rejoined
the board. Why not?
In a high-profile insider dealer
case, the chief executive of Fyffes plc whose
shares were the subject of the illicit trading
said that he was “set up” by Davy, which
acted as broker to both Fyffes and DCC, and
misled by a presentation to investors by
Davy on behalf of his company. He also told
the High Court he believed there was an
arrangement between Davy and the party
found responsible by the courts of insider
dealing for the purpose of selling the shares
they held in his company.
During the boom Davy was criticised for
continually writing glowing reports about
its largest client and former owner, Bank of
Ireland. In February with the price at
€. it wrote: “A low risk balance sheet
and cheap valuation provide a safe place to
hide...This is a low risk bank”. months
later the price was €..
Lucinda: Timmins and now Drennan
The Sindo’s laconic John Drennan, who did
a stint as curmudgeon in Village some years
ago, though he turned out to be disappoint-
ingly sunny, has joined Renua as advisor.
Given his fetish for Creighton in his col-
umns it’s not surprising; though he also
seemed to lionise Eamon Ryan, another
hearty middle-class icon, without ever
uttering a Green sentiment.
Brownstonewalling
Villager has just been sent a standard letter
for forwarding to the city authorities. It
starts: “The City has just released a city-
wide rezoning proposal which would lift
hard-fought-for neighborhood zoning pro-
tections and height limits for new
development – by as much as to %!
The proposal would change the rules for
‘contextual’ zoning districts throughout
the city – zoning districts which communi-
ties frequently fought hard to secure, to
limit the height of new development and
keep it in character with the surrounding
neighborhood”. It could be Dublin, which is
going through the same process, but it’s
actually Manhattan! •
coming to
Dublin
Iarfhlaith
O’Neill:
retired
