Article Category: Affairs of the Nation

Robbos Accounts

May 5, 2016
MARY ROBINSON’S Victoria House Foundation (VHF) has just published its first accounts and all seems to be going swimmingly. However, there is still one... Read more »

FEARGAL QUINN’S €200 MILLION

May 5, 2016
AN ANNOUNCEMENT last month that Swiss bank Lombard Odier was awarded a mandate valued at €200m “for an established international family” went unnoticed by... Read more »

STRIKING OFF TONY O’REILLY

May 5, 2016
THE LATEST chapter in the commercial demise of Tony O’Reilly unfolded last week when the Companies Registration Office listed a company called Columbia Investments... Read more »

INVESTIGATING ROTHSCHILDS BANK

May 5, 2016
GOLDHAWK spotted an interesting report on Bloomberg recently, which said that the Swiss unit of Edmond de Rothschild SA is the subject of a... Read more »

ALAN KELLY POISED FOR LEADERSHIP

May 5, 2016
IT could all have been so different. A raggle taggle government of Blueshirts and Independents is being installed but efforts to re-create a coalition... Read more »

WILL MICHAEL TWEE RESCUE THE PICTURE PALACE IN GALWAY?

May 5, 2016
FANS OF Goldhawk will not be surprised by the ongoing farce surrounding Galway’s multi-million euro bijou but unfinished ‘Picture Palace’ cinema. Details of a... Read more »

LAWYERS FOR BIG TOBACCO

April 21, 2016
A LITTLE noticed part of Fine Gael’s health programme for government as pitched to Independent TDs recently was to reduce the number of smokers... Read more »

PANAMA PAYDAY FOR JOE LEWIS

April 21, 2016
WHILE A couple of high profile Irish names have been appearing in the ‘Panama Papers’ revelations of offshore company activity, including the likes of... Read more »

HALAWA: CAIRO TWO FINGERS TO FLANAGAN

April 21, 2016
HAS the penny not yet dropped with foreign minister Charlie Flanagan that the Egyptian government has contempt for the Irish government’s cap-in-hand approach to... Read more »

“ZAPPER” ZAPPONE FOR NEXT CABINET?

April 21, 2016
KATHERINE ZAPPONE TD, liberal media darling, former beneficiary of Labour Party patronage and probably the most politically correct person in the western world, has... Read more »

Kelly’s Heroes

April 7, 2016
THE seriously diminished Parliamentary Labour Party might want to reconsider their ferocious onslaught against Alan Kelly given the sort of firepower the minister’s brother,... Read more »

TV3 and RTE’s DG

April 7, 2016
DISAPPOINTED luvvies at RTÉ, whose new director general, Dee Forbes, is neither a programmer nor even a production techie, may be even more traumatised... Read more »

MICHAEL NUGENT’S MANY COLOURS

April 7, 2016
ATHEIST IRELAND (AI) founder and chairman, Michael Nugent, struck a blow for the Enlightenment by refusing an official invite to the state ceremony celebrating... Read more »

DENIS O’BRIEN’S TOPAZ LOSS

April 7, 2016
GOLDHAWK was always suspicious of the reports that Denis O’Brien had sold his Topaz petrol retailer to the Canadian giants Couche-Tard for E450m. Now... Read more »

BRENDAN HOWLIN’S DIVINE RIGHT

April 7, 2016
IF Alan Kelly is addicted to power, then Brendan Howlin is a megalomaniac who believes he can assume leadership of the Labour Party without... Read more »

IVAN YATES TO LEAVE NEWSTALK

April 7, 2016
IVAN Yates has decided to leave Newstalk and this time he means it. The broadcaster is now in negotiation with station bosses about the... Read more »

MICHAEL TWEE’S SHARPER TONE

April 7, 2016
NO wonder the director of the Iona Institute, David Quinn, denounced President Michael D Higgins’ 1916 commemorative speeches in the Irish Independent last week.... Read more »

MARY ROBINSON’S NEW DIRECTORS

March 24, 2016
AS PLANS proceed for Mary Robinson’s multi-million euro shrine in Ballina, she had beefed up the board of her new foundation with some familiar... Read more »

REFERENDUM ON EU-US TRADE DEAL?

March 24, 2016
THE Transatlantic Trade & Investment Partnership (TTIP), the trade and investment-protection deal between the EU and the US, threatens to undermine national sovereignties, domestic... Read more »

KIERAN ROSE’S CAMPAIGN

March 24, 2016
CONGRATULATIONS to wily NUI Seanad candidate and impressive self-promoter Kieran Rose. The Dublin City Council senior planner has managed to attract oodles of coverage... Read more »

LABOUR’S SENATE GENDER DEFICIT

March 24, 2016
LABOUR’S horrendous general election, coupled with its equally abysmal local election results, mean that its Seanad voting franchise – councillors and newly elected TDs... Read more »

DENIS O’BRIEN IN THE GOLDMINES

March 24, 2016
WHAT now for the media mogul Denis O’Brien and Red Flag, the PR firm that Denis has chased through the courts for alleged defamation... Read more »

FLOOD/MAHON TRIBUNAL WIPE-OUT

March 24, 2016
THE fiasco that is the Mahon Tribunal has now climaxed with virtually all findings of culpability against previously named parties being dumped. Estimates of... Read more »

“CURIOUS AND UNSETTLING” IN CORK

March 24, 2016
A RETIRED chartered engineer, William Bailey, has just won an important and interesting legal battle in the Court of Appeal concerning an unauthorised multi-million... Read more »

FICKLE FG SENATORS

March 9, 2016
POLITICAL reform is a moveable feast and the decision of several Fine Gael TDs who lost their seats at the election to now go... Read more »

Tim Caffrey’s Departure

March 9, 2016
FAREWELL then to former Longford County Council (LCC) boss, Tim Caffrey, who retired earlier this month. Last October, Caffrey was found by ethics watchdog... Read more »

TONY GREGORY’S LEGACY

March 9, 2016
WAS it for this that Tony Gregory created a movement of the wretched of the inner city? So that Maureen O’Sullivan could become Ceann... Read more »

PR OWN GOALS IN SOUTH DUBLIN

March 9, 2016
FOR A school to be involved in one public controversy is unfortunate, two starts to look like carelessness. The Harold School in Glasthule, south... Read more »

HALAWA INTERNED IN CAIRO

March 9, 2016
IT is now clear that the Egyptian government has effectively interned Ibrahim Halawa, with the latest adjournment of his trial and nearly 500 others... Read more »

WHAT PRICE THE IRISH TIMES?

March 9, 2016
“DELIGHT” was expressed by The Irish Times’ editor and managing director, Kevin O’Sullivan and Liam Kavanagh respectively, in a recent message to staff announcing... Read more »

NORA KHALDI’S BACKERS

March 9, 2016
HOT SHOT entrepreneur Nora Khaldi has been generating plenty of headlines recently, as a result of securing one of the ten places available at... Read more »

JOHN GRAYKEN: THE IRISH VULTURE

March 9, 2016
THE LATEST Forbes list of billionaires included assorted ‘Irish’ moneybags who obtained citizenship here under the now defunct passport-for-sale scheme in the late 1990s,... Read more »

STEPHEN RAE FOR RTÉ DG

February 25, 2016
WHAT a perspicacious article appeared in the Sunday Independent recently informing readers that in the race for the RTÉ director general’s job, Rory Coveney,... Read more »

ENDA KENNY AND THE WHINGERS

February 25, 2016
ENDA KENNY’S gaffe, in which he described people in Castlebar as “All Ireland champion” whingers, has proved a significant setback for Fine Gael. Goldhawk... Read more »

MARKUS JOOSTE’S TAXING MATTERS

February 25, 2016
THE announcement that John Magnier’s Coolmore Stud has agreed a partnership with South African tycoon Markus Jooste is good news for the Coolmore thoroughbred... Read more »