Sinn Fein leader Mary Lou McDonald says Katherine Zappone controversy is a ‘rotten way of doing business’
THE controversy over the Katherine Zappone affair has dominated the headlines again this week.
Foreign Affairs Minister Simon Coveney was forced to apologise to the Taoiseach earlier this year after he made her a UN Special Envoy without telling his coalition partners.
Tanaiste Leo Varadkar this week released screenshots of a series of text messages between himself and Coveney and Zappone about the role and her controversial Merrion Hotel bash. The messages revealed the Fine Gael leader knew about the position ten days before the appointment was sprung on the rest of the Cabinet.
But Coveney claimed he could not produce these texts with Leo because he deleted them due to fears he would be hacked. It’s one of the reasons the fall-out is set to continue in the days and weeks ahead.
Here, Sinn Fein leader MARY LOU MCDONALD writes for the Irish Sun on Sunday about the week’s events.
'ROTTEN BUSINESS'
HERE we go again. It is like a bad case of deja vu.
Simon Coveney and Leo Varadkar’s attempts to lead us all on merry dance about their text exchanges in relation to the Zappone affair is to take people for fools.
It is just the latest episode in the cosy jobs for the boys and girls culture that dominates Fine Gael and Fianna Fail.
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This rotten way of doing business is exactly why we have had bad government after bad government — and why nothing ever changes.
People are sick to their back teeth of it. The Zappone affair and Merriongate shows again that FF and FG are not on the side of workers and families.
Rather than addressing the issues that matter to ordinary people, their focus is always on doing favours for friends and sorting out the golden circles in society.
TEXT CONTROVERSY
We should remember this text controversy is happening because the Government — particularly Simon Coveney and Leo Varadkar — are scrambling to cover their tracks about how a very well-paid, makey-uppy job was created for their ex-ministerial colleague and friend.
We are now six weeks on from when this story broke, but they are still changing their stories and making it up as they go along.
FG’s response since this saga came to light has been one of petulance and a refusal to take responsibility for their actions.
Let’s be clear. This was self-entitled stroke politics from day one. And FG are so used to getting away with it that they don’t like that they have been called out on it.
Public confidence in this coalition is already on the floor but it’s been made all the worse by a weak Taoiseach who refuses to hold his coalition partners to account.
He shows no hesitation in sacking FF ministers for their sins but will not lay a glove on FG Cabinet ministers. In the eyes of Micheal Martin, they are clearly untouchable.
It is all about clinging to power and denying people the change they voted for at the last election. FG and FF clubbed together to block Sinn Fein from delivering that change. People now see those parties desperately clinging to the past, back doing what they do best — looking after the well-connected and well-off.
The arrogance at the heart of Government knows no bounds. Leo Varadkar has said with a straight face that this controversy hasn’t distracted from the business of the Government. This is laughable.
'CULTURE OF CRONYISM'
It isn’t about the ‘political bubble’ as some would say. It has real-life consequences for people. The FF-FG culture of cronyism and making decisions for the vested interests is exactly the reason we have a never-ending housing crisis.
It is why our hospitals are overcrowded and our health service is on its knees. It is why we have an economy that doesn’t deliver for ordinary people. It is why fairness is alien to a Government that denies a State pension to those who have worked hard their entire lives while standing over the reintroduction of bonuses for execs at bailed-out banks.
For those who wonder why Ireland 2021 doesn’t work for them, the answer is found in this broken culture.
Well this generation refuses to be held back by the refusal of FF and FG to change. We know these things can be fixed, put right and made better.
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It is not beyond us to house our people, have a world-class health system and shape a fair economy. It is not beyond us to create a future fuelled by ambition and vision.
We can have a better Ireland that works for everyone. The first step must be ending the cosy club culture that has been the hallmark of far too many governments for far too long.
