Anger over decision to pull plug on stations

THE company that facilitated Muhammad Ali’s visit to Ennis pulled the plug on a number of television stations at the last minute and failed to fulfil a commitment to provide them with footage from the civic reception which was closed to all but a handful of reporters.

The president of Alltech, Dr Pearse Lyons, had previously confirmed thatimages and footage would be made available at “no cost” to media organisations after the event.

At a press briefing inEnnis last week, heexplained that a company called CKX owns the rights to Ali’s image and as a result there would be no press photographers or TV cameras allowed.

Alltech had originallyattempted to bar the media from yesterday’s reception where Ali was conferred with the title Freeman of the Town of Ennis.

At last Tuesday’s press briefing, Dr Lyons attempted to skirt around the issue of access for reporters but when further pressed he stated that it was up to the Mayor of Ennis and Ennis Town Council to decide who they invited to the event.

However, Mayor of Ennis Frankie Neylon acknowledged that the local authority did “not havetotal control over” who would attend.

Three days later, despite the huge international media interest in the event, just five invitations were issued to locally based journalists.

Prior to yesterday, Ali’s representatives had told the television stations that footage would be made available after it had been approved. But, just minutes before the civic reception was due to commence, it emerged that the footage would not be made available to stations.

It is understood that Alltech overruled the original decision by Ali’s representatives shortly before the reception commenced.

Since August 8, when it was confirmed that Ali had accepted an invitation to visit the town, Ennis Town Council had been working feverishly deciding how best to honour the sporting great. However, as the days passed, it became increasingly clear that control of how the event would be organised and run was being gradually removed from the local authority.

Stations including RTÉ, TG4, TV3, BBC and Sky News were left without footage from the reception as a result and were forced to take poor quality shots from the big screen which had been erected in a local car park. UTV, CNN and ITN had also expressed an interest in video feeds.

It is understood that RTÉ had sought footage but because they secured quality images of Ali during his visit to the Turnpike, they did notrequire images from the reception.

Other TV crews, which based themselves close to the official media centre so that they could access the footage, were left furious by the last-minute decision. One producer said: “We have been playing cat and mouse with them all afternoon. We were told just before the reception was due to start that Alltech had decided that no footage would be made available to us. It is a total disgrace and after so many of us travelled so far. We tried contacting Alltech. However, none of us could get through.”