Bertie unfit to be president of Europe

I AM slightly confused, maybe delusional. We are being asked to ratify the Lisbon Treaty in order to create the post of president of Europe for our current Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern.

In that position he will represent 450 million EU citizens, promote their interests — and articulate the values to which they (and we) aspire.

Leave aside for the moment the fact, certified by the Moriarty Tribunal, that he facilitated — but never acknowledged — the grotesque obscenity of what happened to the late Brian Lenihan’s medical appeal fund.

In his own sworn evidence to Mahon last month, he said he had known — nonchalantly — for more than a decade that party funds collected for a different purpose had been diverted to buy a house for the family of an ‘employee’ of the party. (Incidentally, if you check the bored media reports of this evidence on the following day (February 22), you will see he did not, initially, name this anonymous ‘employee’ as Celia Larkin). Is it we ordinary citizens — or the 15 members of the cabinet and the 80-plus TDs who maintain them in office — who are in immediate need of urgent psychotherapy?

Maurice O’Connell

Forge Park

Oakpark

Tralee

Co Kerry