Meeja Watch

Australian journalist Tony Wright wrote a very interesting piece comparing local reaction in Canberra and Dublin to the Russian embassies in those cities [As Russian agents spread lies, Australians could learn from the Irish/April 8]. Wright, an associate editor and special writer with The Sydney Morning Herald, wrote that pro-Ukraine supporters outside the embassy waved signs encouraging passing motorists to honk their horns. The protest would have barefly registered with the diplomats inside the building who he said were busy on social media denying war crimes and the murder of thousands of civilians in Ukraine as fake news. They should consider themselves lucky to be posted to a part of the world where “the incessant honking of car horns” was as bad as it gets. He contrasted this with the situation in Dublin where he wrote the Russian diplomats discovered what it was like to be put into “deep freeze” by the locals who are traditionally “a wildly hospital people who have long been experts at giving the coldest of cold shoulders”. Mr Wright picked up on the story about how a local fuel provider refused to deliver diesel to the Orwell Road Mission, needed for heating and hot water. In fact every supplier the embassy approached refused their business. The Irish Mirror also reported that the embassy would have struggled to pay because its Bank of Ireland accounts had been suspended. “The Irish, wordsmiths without peer, clearly remembered the meaning of a word they gave to the world in 1880: boycott,” wrote Wright. He explained the origin and history of the phrase and how one Captain Charles Boycott, an agent for an absentee landlord, evicted tenant farmers who asked for a rent cut after suffering a bad season. Charles Stewart Parnell, the leader of the Irish Land League said anyone who occupied the farm of an evicted tenant should be shunned. Boycott himself could not get anyone to work for him, businesses would not trade with him and even the postman would not deliver his mail. “And so was born the verb “to boycott”, which governments call “sanctions” and fools call “cancel culture”, added Wright. “With Dubliners reviving the art of the boycott this week, the Russian ambassador there was reduced to begging for help from the Irish Department of Foreign Affairs, which wasn’t commenting.”

https://www.smh.com.au/national/as-russian-agents-spread-lies-australianscould-learn-from-the-irish-20220407-p5ablf.html

A start up tech company in Fremantle got some attention in the business section of the West Australian in March. It also got a mention in The Mayo News the same week. HoverIT was founded and is headed by James Flanagan, a native of Westport, Co. Mayo. In a nutshell his social media friendly e-commerce platform gives local businesses a completely new and innovative way to reach out to their customers, and vice versa. “When a business signs up in a certain town or city, we will automatically filter them under their locational tag and then somebody in that location,whether its a tourist or a local just hits the location tag like ‘Fremantle’ and they’ll get a list of every single business,” the Irishman explained to business journo Cheyanne Enciso. On March 22 The Mayo News reported that Westport was the first town in Ireland to benefit from the new ‘support local’ app. Sarah Flanagan, a sister of James, the owner of the newly opened ‘Enrica’s Cafe’ on Lime Court, Westport was the first local business to sign up to the digital service which James is betting will be a big hit globally.

BY LLOYD GORMAN

An old boy returning to their school to talk to students about their life and career rarely hits the newspapers. But there are not many jobs where you will be the first diplomat to set up the Irish embassy in Moscow and have met Putin shortly after he came into power. Remarkably Jim Sharkey’s talk on March 10 to the students at his alma mater, St. Columb’s College in Derry, was booked in months earlier, the Derry Journal reported. After he left the Derry school Sharkey – a cousin of singer Fergal Sharkey – worked as a history teacher in London, Dublin and Derry before joining the Irish foreign service in 1970. Four years later he was appointed Charge d’Affaires for the opening of the Irish Embassy in Moscow in 1974 and returned again in 2001 as ambassador. Sharkey presented his credentials as a diplomat to one Vladimir Putin, who had just become president, marking the start of his steely rule. He also dealt with him on several occasions in his role. “I did not think that Putin would invade Ukraine,” Mr Sharkey said, the Irish Independent reported (US offer of warplanes for Ukraine ‘could lead to killing fields in Europe’, says Ireland’s ex-envoy to Russia,” on March 13. “There are multiple intimacies between Ukraine and Russia. The intimacies between Russia and Ukraine are even closer than those between Canada and the United States and they are something like the intimacies between the Republic and Northern Ireland.” Indeed so close are the two countries that he said it was easy for some Russians to belive that Ukraine was really an extension of Russia. “From an international and an Irish point of view, clearly the right of Ukraine to full independence is absolute,” Mr Sharkey explained. “I do believe there are many Russians who believe that Putin should not be at war with their friends.” He offered an insightful and sometimes sobering analysis of the situation. “The thought of this war lasting for months is just frightening,” he said. There was the risk of miscalculation and the danger of the American offer of “sophisticated airplanes” to Ukraine, leading to “killing fields” in central Europe. After his first stint in Russia Sharkey went on to become the Irish ambassador to Australia. During his two years here the envoy officially opened the Irish Club in Subiaco. Jim Sharkey.

Robbie Dolan.

Dublin born Paul Niland has been popping up quite a bit in various articles, reports and coverage carried by Irish and international media. The self described businessman, writer and political commentator is – by choice – in a unique and very challenging situation. The 49 year old Irisman is one of an estimated seventy to ninety Irish nationals who chose to stay in Kyiv when Russian forces attacked. “I am not leaving. This is my home. I am very invested in this country,” he told Irish Times journalist Ronan McGreevy in an article published on Feb 12 . “I like many aspects of this country. We are in the process of changing things. There is a dynamic here.” Like other citizens he joined a territorial battalion to defend his neighbourhood. In normal civilian life he is in the business of trying to save lifes. He set up Lifeline Ukraine, a national suicide prevention hotline, about three years ago. In a piece published by the Sydney Morning Herald on April 16 Pete Shmigel, a former Liberal Party adviser, recounted a recent trip to the war torn country – from where his parents fled as refugees after WWII – and meeting with his friend Niland. Shmigel wrote that with the start of the war and as bombs fell and whole suburbs were wiped out calls to his charity service jumped by 40 per cent. “Our focus is on the needs of each person who calls, no matter their circumstances or background or state of mind,” Niland told him. “It’s about non-judgment. For our hotline counsellors, it’s about being fully engaged with that one person in that one moment to save one life.” Even as all hell broke out the life saving service offered by Niland and his team continued to operate from bomb shelters and remote locations while some calls were picked up by similar services in Estonia, Poland and Israel. Niland has vowed to stay on and defend his adopted homeland and to keep trying to help Ukrainians in distress. Less than 24 hours after he blew away the judges and audiences in his blind audtion for the first outing of the new season of The Voice on Australian TV in late April Robbie Dolan was being interviewed by Ray D’Arcy on his morning show on RTE radio. Robbie left his home town of Kildare (a horse racing capital in its own right) in September 2016, to build on his career as a jockey by getting experience in Australia. He left thinking he would be gone for a few months or maybe a year but six years later,

New WA film with Irish story in the pipeline

A little bird told us that shooting is about to get underway on a new movie with a local and Irish connection. Kid Snow is to be a feature film set 1970’s Western Australia, about a washed-up Irish boxer of the same name who is offered a rematch against a man he fought 10 years ago, on a night that changed his life forever. The fight is a chance to redeem himself but ‘Kid’ comes to a crossroads when he meets single mother Sunny and is forced to contemplate a future beyond boxing. We don’t know yet who will play the lead role but we hope to bring you more details and information in the next issue. Filming is due to start in May and will include a couple of weeks in Perth, a short stint in Lancelin and between four and five weeks in Kalgoorlie. Watch this space.

Damian Leith.

having met a local girl with who he had had a baby just a few days earlier. “So I’m stuck here now,” he said. Dolan had been involved in some panto’s as a young fella but apart from that the only singing he ever did was in the shower or in the car. Out of the blue the chance to apply presented itself. “I said feck it, I’ll throw one in, it all happened so quickly” he laughed. No doubt the young jockey with the natural voice of a pop star will be doing a lot of interviews and media work, but this one was unique. “I was there at the beginning, without me DJ’ing, you woulnd’t exist Robbie!,” D’Arcy, who is also from Kildare town and happens to know the family said. Dolan replied: “That’s absolutely true, you were the DJ when my mother asnd father had their first dance in the (CYMS Hall in Kildare town)… you played the first song for them on their first dance.” D’Arcy played a bit of that faithful song ‘My eyes adored you’, by Frankie Valli. He joked that if Ray kept playing it he might have a little brother or sister on the way in a few months. The RTE presenter wished him well with the next stages of the competition and left the door open for further chats. By sheer coincidence the very next guest was another Kildare man with an Australian connection who reminded Ray of yet another local lad who had done well Down Under. Pat O’ Mahoney wrote a book called ‘Rethinking Housing Options for Senior Citizens’ which sets out his argument for why most older people Ann McVeigh can be regularly found around the Irish Club in Subiaco and is a well known face in the Irish community. Her life story was reported by the Irish Independent on March 20 (I forgive those who sent me to Australia’, says Irish woman taken away from her family when she was five years old’, a piece written by Ciaran O’Neill. At the age of five Ann was one of about 120 children (child migrants) from Northern Ireland sent to Australia during the 1940’s and 1950’s by nuns in Belfast, without her family’s permission. Premium subscribers to Independent. ie will be able to access the full story. Alternatively her story is also available on BBC.com from an article by Conor Macauley published in October 2013: ‘Voices of the lost: Speaking of being sent to Australia as a child migrant’.

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-northernireland-24631170 https://www.independent.ie/ irish-news/i-forgive-those-whosent-me-to-australia-says-irishwoman-taken- away-from-her-familywhen-she-was-five-years-old-41466695. html

in Ireland should and could live in retirement villages just like in Australia, where Mahoney spent much of his working life. Before they started that discussion O’Mahoney told D’Arcy that: “He’s not the only person from Newbridge, or Kildare to make a success of his singing career in Australia, another young man from Milltown did it a few years ago.” When he said he was talking about another young man called Damien Leith, the presenter could only say: “Yes, Yes, well remembered.” Leith was raised near Milltown, a small village about 7km from Newbridge, Co. Kildare, just a few miles down the road from Kildare town itself. Leith, 46, a former chemist came to Australia in 2003 and just three years later won Australian Idol. That launched him on a successful showbiz career as a full time musician with eight albums under his belt, ‘Songs from Ireland’ being his latest record.