On November 24, 1972, the Fianna Fáil government fires the RTÉ Authority after it broadcast a recorded radio interview on November 19 by Kevin O’Kelly with Seán Mac Stíofáin, then Chief of Staff of the Provisional Irish Republican Army, on the RTÉ This Week radio programme. Mac Stíofáin is arrested on the same day, charged with IRA membership, and the interview is used as evidence against him. He is sentenced to six months imprisonment on November 25 by the Special Criminal Court in Dublin.
The announcement of dismissal comes shortly before 10:00 p.m. in a statement from Gerry Collins, Minister for Posts and Telegraphs. It is an abrupt but not unexpected climax to a week of conflict and speculation after the broadcast of the Mac Stíofáin interview.
Collins reads the announcement on RTÉ but does not make any further comments. He also announces the appointment of the new Authority. The Taoiseach, Jack Lynch, who is in London for his meeting with British Prime MinisterEdward Heath, is kept fully informed of developments during the day.
Lynch says at the London airport before his departure for Dublin that the dismissal is an exercise in democracy. The action is taken because the Government sees the need for “protecting our community.”
Lynch speaks to reporters just after midnight after arriving at the airport from his dinner with the Prime Minister at 10 Downing Street. He says that the Cabinet had decided its course of action in regard to RTÉ on Tuesday, November 21, and that he had been in touch by phone throughout the day with his colleagues in Dublin.
The RTÉ Authority, the Taoiseach says, is controlled by Acts of Parliament and is subject to the democratic process.
It is the obligation of the Government to ensure that their terms of reference are adhered to. The Authority breached a directive given under the Broadcasting Act, ordering them “not to project people who put forward violent means for achieving their purpose.”
In the opinion of the Government, the interview with Mac Stíofáin is a breach of that directive. When Lynch is asked by a reporter how the Government knew that the RTÉ interview with Mac Stíofáin was taking place, he says that they have their own way of knowing things.
The comments of the members of the dismissed Authority reflect indignation, hurt and relief.
Phyllis O’Kelly, widow of the late Seán T. O’Kelly, former President of Ireland, says that it was “a strange thing to happen.” She does not accept that the station was deliberately trying to outwit the Government. The interviewer, Kevin O’Kelly, had listed various people that he wished to interview, and they seemed all right to her.
The Authority’s letter to the Minister makes it abundantly clear that the Authority appreciates his right to issue the direction. It also makes clear its anxiety to abide by that direction.
Cosgrave is born at 174 James’s Street, Dublin, on June 5, 1880, to Thomas Cosgrave, grocer, and Bridget Cosgrave (née Nixon). He is educated at the Christian Brothers School at Malahide Road, Marino, Dublin, before entering his father’s publican business. He first becomes politically active when he attends the first Sinn Féin convention in 1905.
At an early age, Cosgrave is attracted to the Irish nationalist party Sinn Féin. He becomes a member of the Dublin Corporation in 1909 and is subsequently reelected to represent Sinn Féin interests. He joins the Irish Volunteers in 1913, although he never joins the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB) because he does not believe in secret societies. When the group splits in 1914 upon the outbreak of World War I, he sides with a radical Sinn Féin minority against the constitutional nationalists led by John Redmond, who supports the British war effort.
Cosgrave takes part in the 1916 Easter Rising and is afterward interned by the British for a short time. In 1917, he is elected to Parliament for the city of Kilkenny. In the sweeping election victory of Sinn Féin in the 1918 United Kingdom general election, he becomes a member of the First Dáil. He is made Minister for Local Government in the first republican ministry, and during the Irish War of Independence (1919–21) his task is to organize the refusal of local bodies to cooperate with the British in Dublin.
Cosgrave is a supporter of the 1921 Anglo-Irish Treaty settlement with Great Britain, and he becomes Minister of Local Government in Ireland’s provisional government of 1922. He replaces Michael Collins as Chairman of the Provisional Government when the latter becomes commander-in-chief of the National Army in July 1922. He also replaces Arthur Griffith as president of the Dáil after Griffith’s sudden death on August 12, 1922. As the first president of the Executive Council of the Irish Free State, he, who had helped found the political party Cumann na nGaedheal in April 1923 and became its leader, represents Ireland at the Imperial Conference in October 1923. A month earlier he is welcomed as Ireland’s first spokesman at the assembly of the League of Nations.
Cosgrave’s greatest achievement is to establish stable democratic government in Ireland after the Irish Civil War (1922–23). In the Dáil there is no serious opposition, since the party headed by Éamon de Valera, which refuses to take the oath prescribed in the treaty, abstains from attendance. But neither Cosgrave nor his ministry enjoy much popularity. Order requires drastic measures, and taxation is heavy and sharply collected. He seems sure of a long tenure only because there is no alternative in sight.
In July 1927, shortly after a general election, the assassination of Kevin O’Higgins, the vice president, produces a crisis. The Executive Council introduces a Public Safety Act, which legislates severely against political associations of an unconstitutional character and introduces a bill declaring that no candidature for the Dáil should be accepted unless the candidate declares willingness to take a seat in the Dáil and to take the oath of allegiance. The result of this measure is that de Valera and his party decide to attend sessions in the Dáil, and, since this greatly alters the parliamentary situation, Cosgrave obtains leave to dissolve the assembly and hold a general election. The September 1927 Irish general election leaves his party numerically the largest in the Dáil but without an overall majority. He continues in office until de Valera’s victory at the 1932 Irish general election. Cumann na nGaedheal joins with two smaller opposition parties in September 1933 to form a new party headed by Cosgrave, Fine Gael (“Irish Race”), which becomes Ireland’s main opposition party. In 1944 he resigns from the leadership of Fine Gael.
Cosgrave dies on November 16, 1965, at the age of 85. The Fianna Fáil government under Seán Lemass awards him the honour of a state funeral, which is attended by the Cabinet, the leaders of all the main Irish political parties, and Éamon de Valera, then President of Ireland. He is buried in Goldenbridge Cemetery in Inchicore, Dublin. Richard Mulcahy says, “It is in terms of the Nation and its needs and its potential that I praise God who gave us in our dangerous days the gentle but steel-like spirit of rectitude, courage and humble self-sacrifice, that was William T. Cosgrave.”
While Cosgrave never officially holds the office of Taoiseach (prime minister), Ireland considers him to be its first Taoiseach due to having been the Free State’s first head of government.
Cosgrave’s son, Liam, serves as a TD (1943-81), as leader of Fine Gael (1965-77) and Taoiseach (1973-77). His grandson, also named Liam, also serves as a TD and as Senator. His granddaughter, Louise Cosgrave, serves on the Dún Laoghaire–Rathdown County Council (1999-2009).
In October 2014, Cosgrave’s grave is vandalised, the top of a Celtic cross on the headstone being broken off. It is again vandalised in March 2016.
Blaney is first elected to Dáil Éireann for the Donegal East constituency in a by-election in December 1948, following the death of his father from cancer. He also becomes a member of the Donegal County Council. He remains on the backbenches for a number of years before he is one of a group of young party members handpicked by Seán Lemass to begin a re-organisation drive for the party following the defeat at the 1954 Irish general election. Within the party he gains fame by running the party’s by-election campaigns throughout the 1950s and 1960s. His dedicated bands of supporters earn the sobriquet “the Donegal Mafia,” and succeed in getting Desmond O’Malley and Gerry Collins elected to the Dáil.
Following Fianna Fáil’s victory at the 1957 Irish general election, Éamon de Valera, as Taoiseach, brings new blood into the Cabinet in the shape of Blaney, Jack Lynch, Kevin Boland and Mícheál Ó Móráin. Blaney is appointed Minister for Posts and Telegraphs however he moves to the position of Minister for Local Government at the end of 1957 following the death of Seán Moylan. He retains the post when Lemass succeeds de Valera as Taoiseach in 1959. During his tenure it becomes possible to pay rates by installment and he also introduces legislation which entitles non-nationals to vote in local elections.
In 1966 Lemass resigns as Taoiseach and Fianna Fáil leader. The subsequent leadership election sees Cork politician Jack Lynch become party leader and Taoiseach. In the subsequent cabinet reshuffle Blaney is appointed Minister for Agriculture and Fisheries.
In 1969, when conflict breaks out in Northern Ireland, Blaney is one of the first to express strong Irish republican views, views which contradict the policy of the Irish Government, in support of Northern nationalists. From around late 1968 onwards, he forms and presides over an unofficial Nationalist group in Leinster House popularly known as “the Letterkenny Table.” The group is dominated by Blaney up until his death.
There is general surprise when, in an incident known as the Arms Crisis, Blaney, along with Charles Haughey, is sacked from Lynch’s cabinet amid allegations of the use of the funds to import arms for use by the IRA. Lynch asks for their resignations but both men refuse, saying they did nothing illegal. Lynch then advises President de Valera to sack Haughey and Blaney from the government. Haughey and Blaney are subsequently tried in court but are acquitted. However, many of their critics refuse to recognise the verdict of the courts. Although Blaney is cleared of wrongdoing, his ministerial career is brought to an end.
Lynch subsequently moves against Blaney so as to isolate him in the party. When Blaney and his supporters try to organise the party’s national collection independently, Lynch acts and in 1972 Blaney is expelled from Fianna Fáil for “conduct unbecoming.”
Following his expulsion from Fianna Fáil, Kevin Boland tries to persuade Blaney to join the Aontacht Éireann party he is creating but Blaney declines. Instead, he contests all subsequent elections for Independent Fianna Fáil – The Republican Party, an organisation that he built up. Throughout the 1970s there are frequent calls for his re-admittance to Fianna Fáil but the most vocal opponents of this move are Fianna Fáil delegates from County Donegal.
In the Fine Gael–Labour Partycoalition government which takes office after the 1973 Irish general election, Donegan is appointed as Minister for Defence. In October 1976, he makes a speech on an official visit to the opening of new kitchen facilities in an army barracks at Mullingar, County Westmeath in which he describes as a “thundering disgrace” PresidentCearbhall Ó Dálaigh‘s refusal to sign the Emergency Powers Bill 1976. Ó Dálaigh had instead exercised his powers under Article 26 of the Constitution of Ireland to refer it to the Supreme Court. The Taoiseach, Liam Cosgrave, refuses Donegan’s resignation. On October 21, Fianna Fáil proposes a motion in the Dáil calling on the minister to resign, which is defeated. Ó Dálaigh views the refusal to remove the minister as an affront to his office by the government and resigns on October 22, 1976.
In December 1976, Donegan is appointed as Minister for Lands. In February 1977, this office is restructured as the Minister for Fisheries. He serves in cabinet until the government loses office after the 1977 Irish general election.
Donegan retires from politics at the 1981 Irish general election. He dies at his home in County Louth on November 26,2000, following a long illness. Tributes in the Dáil are led by John Bruton as Fine Gael leader. He is buried in his hometown of Monasterboice, County Louth.
Ahern and her books have won numerous awards, including the Irish Book Award for Popular Fiction for The Year I Met You (2014). She publishes several novels and contributes a number of short stories to various anthologies.
Before starting her writing and producing career, Ahern obtains a degree in journalism and media communications from Griffith College Dublin, but withdraws from a master’s degree course to pursue her writing career.
In 2002, when Ahern is twenty-one, she writes her first novel, PS, I Love You. Published in 2004, it is the number 1 bestseller in Ireland (for 19 weeks), the United Kingdom, United States, Germany and the Netherlands. It is sold in over forty countries. The book is adapted as a motion picture directed by Richard LaGravenese and starring Hilary Swank and Gerard Butler. It is released in the United States on December 21, 2007.
Ahern’s second book, Where Rainbows End (known as Love, Rosie in the United States), also reaches number 1 in Ireland and the United Kingdom and wins the German Corine Literature Prize in 2005. It is adapted as a motion picture titled Love, Rosie which is released in 2014, directed by Christian Ditter and starring Lily Collins and Sam Claflin.
Ahern has contributed to charity books with the royalties from short stories such as Irish Girls are Back in Town and Ladies’ Night.
Ahern’s book The Gift is published just before Christmas 2008 in the United Kingdom. Her following book, The Book of Tomorrow, is published on October 1, 2009. In 2016, she releases Flawed, her first book for young adults, and Lyrebird.
Ahern is nominated for Best Newcomer 2004/5 at the British Book Awards for her debut novel PS, I Love You. She wins the 2005 Irish Post Award for Literature and a 2005 Corine Literature Prize for her second book Where Rainbows End, which is voted for by German readers. In 2006, she is long listed for the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award for PS, I Love You. Cosmopolitan US honours her with a Fun Fearless Fiction Award 2007 for If You Could See Me Now. Irish Tatler awards her Writer of the Year at the Woman of the Year awards in 2009. Her fifth novel, Thanks for the Memories, is nominated for Most Popular Book in the British Book Awards 2008. She is voted Author of Year in the UK Glamour Awards in 2008.
Ahern marries David Keoghan in 2010. They have three children, two daughters and a son. As of 2015, they reside in Malahide in County Dublin. She had COVID-19 in early 2022, describing it as “kind of mild. I was lucky.”
Lee is married to Mary Lee (née Kitson) and they have two children, Alison and Harry, and live in Cabinteely. He famously travels to work at RTÉ using a Segway, once giving it a test ride live on Tubridy Tonight.
Lee joins the civil service as an executive officer in the Central Statistics Office (CSO). Two years later he enters University College Dublin where he studies economics under academics such as Brendan Walsh and Peter Neary.
Prior to his move into broadcasting, Lee lectures at NUI Galway and then works as a journalist with The Sunday Business Post. He is also a Senior Economist at Riada Stockbrokers. He also works as Treasury Economist with FTI and as a research economist with the Central Bank of Ireland.
From 1992 to 2009 Lee worked at RTÉ, the public broadcasting service of Ireland. He is appointed Economics Editor with RTÉ in 1996. He is named Irish Journalist of the Year, along with Charlie Bird, in 1998 after they uncover a major tax evasion and overcharging scandal at National Irish Bank. He has devised, researched and presented several television series, including Moneybox, More to Do, Winds of Change, and Beyond the Berlin Wall. He is thought of as an “economics guru.” He leaves RTÉ in the late 1990s to work for BCP Stockbrokers. He leaves the job and returns to his RTÉ post the next day.
Before embarking on his political career, Lee films a four-part series based on the fall of the Berlin Wall in 2008. It is aired on RTÉ One in November 2009.
Lee is parodied in the 1990s comedy Bull Island, where he is seen “menacingly staring down the lens of a camera,” and is also featured on RTÉ 2fm‘s Nob Nation.
On May 5, 2009, on RTÉ News at One on RTÉ Radio 1, Lee announces that he is resigning as Economic Editor with RTÉ and announces his intention to seek the Fine Gael nomination for the Dublin Southby-election in 2009. He takes a year’s unpaid leave from RTÉ in May 2009. On May 6, 2009, he is chosen as the Fine Gael candidate for the by-election. He is the only candidate for the nomination.
Lee is elected on the first count to represent Dublin South on June 6, 2009. He receives over 53% of the 1st preference vote. In total he receives 27,768 1st preference votes. When elected, he is referred to as a “Celebrity TD.” His RTÉ position is filled by Europe editor Sean Whelan, but only as correspondent. Instead, David Murphy is promoted to Business Editor.
Lee highlights the failure of EMPG, the holding company for U.S. publisher Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, and the potential impact on the Irish taxpayers of the loans given by Anglo Irish Bank to the investors in EMPG on January 13, 2010. He sees this as another example for the urgent need of an investigation into the Irish banking crisis.
On February 8, 2010, Lee announces his resignation from Fine Gael and from Dáil Éireann, due to having “virtually no influence or input” into shaping Fine Gael’s economic policies at a time of economic upheaval. It emerges that on February 2, he met with the Fine Gael leader Enda Kenny and told him of his intention to resign. Kenny then offered Lee the frontbench position as spokesman on economic planning. Speaking to reporters outside Leinster House soon after his announcement, Lee says it would have been dishonest of him to accept the position. “I had absolutely no input for nine months. I think I had to be honest with myself and honest with the electorate about that and not pretend.” Asked if his resignation is a vote of no confidence in Kenny, he says there are “certainly lots of large mutterings at the moment in relation to the leader’s position.” He says he had “minimal involvement” with Fine Gael finance spokesman Richard Bruton.
Kenny notes Lee had been appointed chair of the party’s committee on economic policy and also its forum. “I had anticipated a very important role for [George Lee] in the coming period with Fine Gael.” Kenny’s spokesman later dismisses the proposition that the resignation had implications for his leadership. He cited the public endorsement of Kenny by 20 Dáil deputies over the course of the weekend. Former Fine Gael leader Michael Noonan says he is surprised at the decision. “I thought that George Lee was fitting in well,” adding that he believes he would have been a cabinet member in a Fine Gael-led government.
Lee is criticised after his resignation by Senator Eoghan Harris, who is speaking on the Lunchtime programme of Newstalk Radio. Harris suggests financial considerations and long working hours of politicians are the reasons for Lee’s resignation. Fine Gael TDBrian Hayes, who is Lee’s campaign manager in the Dublin South by-election, says that in discussions with Lee, the latter had complained about “a major reduction in his income” since leaving RTÉ to become a Dáil backbencher. Lee denies that financial considerations had anything to do with his decision to quit politics.
RTÉ receives a letter from Lee confirming his intentions to return after his leave of absence. The Sunday Tribune says on February 14, 2010, that he will have to wait for three months before returning to RTÉ. Exactly a year after leaving RTÉ, he returns to the broadcaster on May 5, 2010. He works as an advisor on the RTÉ business desk. He presents Mind Your Business on RTÉ Radio 1 on Saturday Mornings as a summer replacement for The Business.
When John Murray moves to present his own programme, Lee takes over The Business slot on September 4, 2010, on Saturday mornings on RTÉ Radio 1. In addition to the radio edition, he has presented a televised version on RTÉ One, also titled The Business.
Lee has been Environment Correspondent for RTÉ since June 27, 2019.
Following his exit from politics in 1957, having lost his Dáil seat, Finlay resumes practicing as a barrister. He successfully defends Captain James Kelly in the infamous 1970 arms trial.
In 1971, Finlay is tasked by the Fianna Fáil government with representing Ireland before the European Commission of Human Rights, when, in response to the ill treatment of detainees by security forces in Northern Ireland, they charge the British government with torture. Despite the notional recourse such prisoners would have within the British legal system, the Commission rules the complaint admissible.
During this period Finlay presides over a number of landmark cases, including Attorney General v X in 1992, when he overturns a High Court injunction preventing a pregnant teenage rape victim travelling to the UK for an abortion.
When, in the same year, Judge Liam Hamilton of the High Court, chair of the Beef Tribunal, seeks disclosure of the cabinet’s minutes for a particular meeting, Chief Justice Finlay along with the majority of the Supreme Court deny the request ruling that the concept of collective government responsibility in the Constitution takes precedence.
Finlay announces his resignation as Chief Justice of Ireland and retirement as a judge in 1994.
After his retirement, Finlay presides over a number of public inquiries.
In 1996, Finlay oversees the inquiry into the violence by English fans at the aborted 1995 friendly soccer match versus the Republic of Ireland at Lansdowne Road. His report to Bernard Allen, Minister for Sport, is critical of security arrangements on the night and recommends improvements to ticketing, seat-allocation, fan-vetting and policing arrangements. The Irish Government shares his report with the British Home Office.
After the collapse of The Irish Press group in 1995, the Minister for Enterprise and Employment, John Bruton, receives a damming report from the Competition Authority that Independent Newspapers has abused its dominant position and acted in an anti-competitive manner by purchasing a shareholding in The Irish Press. In September 1995, Bruton announces the Commission on the Newspaper Industry with an extremely wide remit to examine diversity and ownership, competitiveness, editorial freedom and standards of coverage in Irish newspapers as well as the impact of the sales of the British press in Ireland. Minister Bruton appoints 21 people to the commission and appoints Finlay chair. Due to the wide remit and huge number of submissions, the commission’s report is delayed but is eventually published at the end of July recommending widespread reforms.
Following the discovery of the BTSB anti-D scandal, in 1996, Finlay is appointed the chair and singular member of the Tribunal of Inquiry into the Blood Transfusion Service Board. The speed and efficiency with which his BTSB Tribunal conducts its business, restores confidence in the Tribunal as a mechanism of resolving great controversies in the public interest.
Finlay also sits on an Irish Rugby Football Union (IRFU) panel to adjudicate on the cases of Rugby players accused of using banned performance-enhancing substances.
Finlay is married to Alice Blayney, who predeceases him in 2012. They have five children, two of whom follow in his family’s legal tradition: his son John being a Senior Counsel and his daughter Mary Finlay Geoghegan a former judge of the High Court, Court of Appeal and Supreme Court. Whenever his work schedule allows, he escapes to County Mayo where he indulges his passion for fishing.
Thomas Finlay dies at the age of 95 in Irishtown, Dublin, on December 3, 2017.
As part of the larger Congo Crisis (1960–1964), the siege of Jadotville begins on September 13, 1961, lasting for five days. While serving under the United Nations Operation in the Congo (Opération des Nations Unies au Congo, ONUC), a small contingent of the Irish Army‘s 35th Battalion, designated “A” Company, are besieged at the UN base near the mining town of Jadotville (modern-day Likasi) by Katangese forces loyal to the secessionist State of Katanga. The siege takes place during the seven-day escalation of hostilities between ONUC and Katangese forces during Operation Morthor. Although the contingent of 156 Irish soldiers repels attacks by a 3,000-strong Katangese force, they are eventually forced to surrender after running out of ammunition and water. “A” Company is subsequently held as prisoners of war for approximately one month, before being released on October 15 as part of a prisoner exchange. The Irish forces inflict approximately 1,300 casualties (including up to 300 killed) on the Katangan force, with no deaths amongst “A” Company.
On the morning of Wednesday, September 13, 1961, the soldiers stationed at Jadotville are informed of Operation Morthor by UN Headquarters at Elisabethville. At 07:40 twenty Katangese troops attack while many of the UN Irish troops of A Company are attending an open-air Mass. Expecting to take the men off-guard, the first attackers move in rapidly. However, they are spotted by an Irish sentry, and a warning shot by Private Billy Ready alerts the company to the threat. Ready is wounded in a later exchange of fire.
The paramilitary Katangese Gendarmerie, which is a combined force of mercenaries, Belgian settlers and local tribesmen, attack the Irish company. The attackers have a strength of 3,000–5,000 men – consisting of mostly Katangese and settlers, but with many Belgian, French and Rhodesian mercenaries armed with a mix of weapons. Additionally, these forces have limited air support from a Fouga CM.170 Magister trainer-light ground attack jet fitted with a pair of underwing bombs and twin 7.5 mm machine guns, which repeatedly attacks the UN position. The Irish soldiers are armed with personal weapons, several water-cooled Vickers machine guns, 60 mm mortars and two Irish-built Ford Mark VI armoured cars under the command of Lieutenant Kevin Knightly.
The Katangese attack in waves of 600 or so, preceded by bombardment from 81 mm mortars and a French 75mm field gun. The Irish Support Platoon of “A” Company knocks out most of the Katangese mortar and artillery positions, including the 75mm gun, with counter-battery fire from 60mm mortars. The fire from the UN Irish positions proves accurate and effective. Mercenary officers are reportedly observed shooting native gendarmes to stem the rout caused in Katangese lines.
The 500 Irish and Swedish UN troops based in Kamina, and Indian army Gurkhas make several attempts to relieve the besieged Irish soldiers. The supporting force of mercenaries beat back these efforts. They have been brought in by Moïse Tshombe, Katanga’s premier, whose secessionist government has been supported by Belgium.
Attempting to reach the besieged “A” Company, the relief column, named “Force Kane” after its commander Commandant John Kane, is stymied in a series of battles at a pinch point called the Lufira Bridge. It carries the Jadotville-to-Elisabethville Highway across the Lufira River. The Katangese forces dig in here and bring heavy and sustained ground and air fire onto the relief column, killing three Indian UN troops, injuring a number of Irish UN troops and ultimately forcing the column off the bridge. Additionally, during the effort to reach the trapped company, the Katanga forces set off charges on the railway bridge to impede potential relief efforts.
On September 14, the Katangan Fouga jet flies passes over the battlefield, dropping bombs that rendered the Company’s vehicles inert and cause injuries to Privates Tahaney and Gormley.
During the siege, the Irish radio to their headquarters: “We will hold out until our last bullet is spent. Could do with some whiskey.”
On September 16, a second attempt to reach the Irish Company is made but fails with another three Indian troops being killed and a further eight soldiers suffering injuries. The Katangese ask Commandant Pat Quinlan for a ceasefire, as their own forces have been seriously diminished. By this time their effective strength may have been reduced to 2,000 men. Later that same day, a ceasefire agreement is reached between Commandant Quinlan and the Burgomaster of the Katangan forces, enabling the Irish troops to re-supply with water. The Gendarmerie retreat from their positions surrounding the UN.
Quinlan lacks any clear direction or communication from his superiors, and the Katangese gradually infringe on the ceasefire agreement to undermine “A” Company’s position. With his position untenable, without any clear orders or promise of assistance, having run out of ammunition and food and being low on water, Quinlan accepts their second offer to surrender. On September 17, Quinlan meets with Katanga Minister Munongo, in which a formal written ceasefire and surrender agreement is made, which contains the proviso that the Irish Company will keep their weapons and be unharmed.
“A” Company, 35th Battalion, suffers five wounded in action during the siege. The Katangese suffered up to 300 killed, including 30 mercenaries and an indeterminate number of wounded, with figures ranging from 300 to 1,000.
The Irish soldiers are held as hostages for approximately one month, in an effort to extort terms of ceasefire that are embarrassing to the United Nations.
After being released, the troops are returned to their base in Elisabethville. Some weeks later, however, “A” Company finds itself in active combat again, this time with the support of Swedish UN troops. Eventually, they are reinforced with fresh troops from Ireland, their replacement being the 36th Battalion. After weeks of fighting and their six-month tour of duty now complete, “A” Company is rotated out of the battle zone and are home in Ireland that December.
In 2016, the Irish government awards a Presidential Unit Citation to “A” Company, the first in the State’s history. In October 2017, a plaque commemorating Quinlan is unveiled in his native County Kerry, by former TaoiseachEnda Kenny. The decision of the State to honour individually the soldiers of Jadotville or their next of kin is one of the last decisions taken by Kenny before he retires as Taoiseach in June 2017. They are presented with newly designed Siege of Jadotville Medals in Athlone on December 2, 2017.
(Pictured: No.3 Platoon, A Company, 35th Battalion, pose in front of a UN relief helicopter, September 17, 1961)
Born Ann Teresa O’Donnell, she studies medicine at Trinity College Dublin (TCD). She drops out without taking a degree and later marries a young barrister, Ronan Keane. The couple separates in the 1990s, but never divorce. Ronan Keane goes on to become Chief Justice of Ireland (2000-2004).
Keane spends the majority of her career working for the Irish newspaper, the Sunday Independent, where she is the principal contributor of the newspaper’s long-running gossip column, “The Keane Edge.”
In “The Keane Edge” column there are often hints of a relationship with a prominent political figure, named in the column as Sweetie, and her relationship is apparently widely known in certain circles, though never openly confirmed. She leaves the paper on bad terms after selling the story of her 27-year affair with former TaoiseachCharles Haughey to the British newspaper The Sunday Times, a rival to the affiliated LondonIndependent newspapers, though she admits her affair on The Late Late Show in 1999.
Keane’s death on May 31, 2008, after a long illness is announced by her son-in-law, the Irish garden designer and television personality Diarmuid Gavin. She is survived by her children Jane, Madeleine and Justine, who is married to Gavin. Her son Tim dies in 2004. One of her granddaughters, Holly Carpenter, is Miss Ireland in 2011.
On December 5, 2011, Pringle delivers a televised address to the nation, representing the technical group of TDs in Dáil Éireann. He does so in response to TaoiseachEnda Kenny‘s address to the nation of the previous evening. Later that month, he calls on people for support in a campaign not to pay a new household charge brought in as part of the latest austerity budget and announces that he will not register for the tax or pay it.
In February 2012, Pringle publishes his expenses online. He is elected leader of the technical group in Dáil Éireann in March 2012.
In May 2012, Pringle brings an unsuccessful High Court challenge over the 2012 European Fiscal Compact referendum and the European Stability Mechanism (ESM) Treaty which is appealed to the Supreme Court in July 2012. In July 2012, the Irish Supreme Court decides to refer three questions to the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) arising out of his challenge of the European Stability Mechanism Treaty and doubts about the ESM’s legality under the Treaties of the European Union. The CJEU holds an oral hearing on the referral on October 23, 2012. It is the first time that the full court sits to hear a reference from a member state of the Union. The 27 judges hear oral arguments from the counsel for Pringle, Ireland, nine other member states, the Commission, the Council, and the European Parliament. On November 27, 2012, the EU Court of Justice dismisses Pringle’s arguments and rules that the ESM is in accordance with the Treaties.
In the 2016 Irish general election, after a re-drawing of constituency boundaries, Pringle campaigns in the new five-seater Donegal constituency. He is re-elected to the final seat by a margin of just 184 votes over Sinn Féin’s Pádraig Mac Lochlainn. During negotiations to form a government, Pringle says he is glad not to have signed up to the Independent Alliance, after that group enters talks with Taoiseach Enda Kenny. He says that unless Kenny or Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin sign up to Right2Change, he will not support either as Taoiseach.
As of April 2016, Pringle had become a member of the Independents 4 Change technical group in the Dáil.
In May 2016, Pringle introduces legislation designed to retain water in public ownership and avoid further privatisation.
Pringle puts forward a bill calling on the government to end public spending from fossil fuels, which passes, making Ireland the first country to fully divest public money from fossil fuels. In June 2022, he puts forward a bill proposing a referendum on lowering the voting age to sixteen.
seamus dubhghaill 