Donie's Sunday news Ireland Blog

Bertie Ahearn the former leader of Fianna Fail resigns from the party

   

Former Irish prime minister Bertie Ahern has resigned from his political party in the wake of a corruption inquiry and before his party passed a motion next week to expel him..

Mr Ahern was accused of not telling the truth in findings of the Mahon Tribunal which examined his past finances.

Writing in Ireland’s Sunday Independent, Mr Ahern said leaving Fianna Fail was a “political decision” and insisted it should not be interpreted as an admission of wrongdoing.

Mr Ahern’s move pre-empted a Fianna Fail party meeting next week when members were due to vote whether to expel him and other party members named in the report.

Current party leader Micheal Martin proposed that his former colleagues be removed claiming Mr Ahern had betrayed the trust placed in him by his country and his party.

But the former Irish premier has vehemently defended his reputation and in the article in the Sunday Independent indicated he would challenge the findings.

The inquiry has shamed a series of senior figures in Fianna Fail, once considered the dominant, establishment party in Irish politics.

It did not brand Mr Ahern, the leader of three Irish coalition governments corrupt, but refused to accept any explanations he offered for a quarter of a million of bank lodgements he made in the early 1990s.

The tribunal panel sat for over 15 years, heard 900-plus days of public sittings and conducted extensive forensic financial trawls.

Mr Ahern’s political legacy has been shattered – none of his evidence for lodgements of more than IR£250,000 between 1993 and 1995 has been accepted. The inquiry also warned it could not find where some money came from

Oil strike first and now Gas:Providence finds gas at Barryroe field as well

       

PROVIDENCE Resources said the offshore well that made the headlines around the world last week because it appeared to have commercial amounts of oil may also contain large gas reserves.

The Dublin-based oil explorer said the Barryroe field about 50kms off Kinsale, Co Cork, had produced more gas than expected.

“You know why it was more gas than expected? We didn’t expect any gas,” Providence chief executive Tony O’Reilly said yesterday.

“It would add more excitement to the huge excitement I’m feeling from last week,” he added.

Providence said last week that the field produced oil at a rate of 3,500 barrels per day, exceeding the 1,800 rate needed for the oil field to be commercial.

‘A big Surprise’

The Barryroe field is located close to the Seven Heads gas field that produced gas in the 1980s but later disappointed investors.

New computer images suggest that Barryroe differs from Seven Heads because the oil and gas are found in huge chambers rather than hundreds of small chambers.

“Mother nature can surprise on the upside,” Mr O’Reilly said. The gas may be brought ashore using old pipelines already located under the sea or it may be used to help Providence run machinery that will extract oil from the seabed, he added.

Providence said yesterday that final test results showed a gas bearing zone produced initial flows of 1,350 barrels a day.

Providence controls significant acreage off the coast of Irelandand has an 80pc interest in the Barryroe well with Lansdowne Oil & Gas owning the remaining stake.

“This all adds up to a very successful find close to the Barryroe well,” said Davy Stockbrokers analyst Job Langbroek.

“We value the group in total at £11.60 risked, of which Barryroe makes up £3.69 — assuming a 59-million barrel resource only — all the early indications suggest that this is a conservative estimate.”

The US House of Rep wants the Taoiseach to ban Che Guevara statue in Galway

   

The chair of the  US House of representatives Ileana Ros-Lehtinen above middle photo.

The US House of Representatives Committee on Foreign Affairs has written to the Taoiseach asking him to stop Galway City Council erecting a statue in Eyre Square to South American revolutionary Che Guevara.

The hard-hitting letter, which describes Che Guevara as a “mass murderer”, was sent by House chairman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, a Republican representative for Florida, last Tuesday.

The letter said: “Che was a mass murderer and human rights abuser, whose campaigns led to the murder of countless people throughout Cuba, under the Castro regime, and Latin America.”

The letter goes on to ask the Government to intervene in the issue and to prevent the controversial monument being erected.

Last month Galway City Council announced it planned to erect the statue of the Marxist guerrilla who helped Fidel Castro to power in Cuba in 1959 because of Che’s historic link to Galway via his grandmother, who was a Lynch from the city.

Businessman Declan Ganley said the proposal was “a pet project of a small bunch of extremists in the Labour Party” that would damage the reputation of Galway internationally.