Letters to the Editor: Hands off the GAA
Keynote speaker Taoiseach Micheál Martin, TD shares a laugh with Cllr AnnMarie Ahern, Cllr Seamus McGrath and Michael Moynihan, Irish Examiner at the Irish Examiner Future Cork 2026 event at The Metropole Hotel, Cork. Picture: Larry Cummins
One of your recent editorials included comments made by Taoiseach Micheál Martin at the ’s Future Cork event.
It is reported that the Taoiseach suggested that the day is long gone when sports organisations in this country could lay full claim to the properties that they rightfully own.
What an outrageous and stupid comment for anyone to make — not alone the political leader of the country.
I have no doubt that Micheál Martin was aiming his remarks in the direction of the GAA and, in particular, SuperValu Páirc Uí Chaoimh as, of course, this is the organisation that provides the vast majority of playing facilities in the country.
This is the organisation that has spent 142 years acquiring and developing marvellous facilities in every village, town, urban area, and city in the 32 counties, mostly done out of their own resources.
The Taoiseach now wants us to hand them over to the State or local authorities, labelling them under the new buzzword “municipal”.
Imagine what would happen to these great arenas if they were under the control of a government that has overseen the National Children’s Hospital.
Perish the thought.
It amazes me, and I am sure many others, how various arms of the media, including yourselves, insist on raising the matter of the €30m grant given by the Government towards the magnificent stadium that is SuperValu Páirc Uí Chaoimh.
For some reason, the Aviva Stadium — which got over six times that amount — does not come in for the same scrutiny or indeed the white elephant that is the Cork Event Centre.
You also suggest that, because SuperValu Páirc Uí Chaoimh availed of this grant, the State should have a stake in its operations.
Would this mean that the thousands of householders who have received government grants to improve their homes with retro-fitting and solar panels should allow the Government to dictate what they do with their homes? I do not think so.
You also imply that, because Micheál Martin was an officer of a GAA club for a short while in the distant past, it should give greater validation to his views.
Thousands upon thousands of people have been officers of GAA clubs, many of them for long periods, but I am sure they would not claim that it bestowed on them any powers of wisdom.
Do the hundreds of golf clubs in the country come under the Taoiseach’s suggestion of acceding ownership of their properties? No, I do not think so.
As a proud GAA man with no political affiliations whatsoever, I would suggest to Micheál Martin that he should concentrate on the issues he has in his Government and his own party and keep his hands off of the GAA.
As we approach St Patrick’s Day in the midst of an ever widening and unnecessary conflict, Micheál Martin finds himself in an increasingly uncomfortable position.
He is hanging onto a rising balloon that gets more precarious the closer we get to that date.
Throughout the Gaza conflict, along with the ongoing collective punishment of the Palestinian population, he reiterated the importance of the adherence to international law and the rules-based order — much to the chagrin of Israel.
However, with the unprovoked attack on Iran by both the US and Israel, we are again seeing a blatant breach of international law.
However, this time, we get a more muted response from our Taoiseach.
How must he feel as he approaches his date in the White House, knowing that the recipient of his sycophantic pageantry has set the world in chaos to create a distraction from the increasing pressure he is feeling domestically.
For both Trump and Netanyahu, this attack is a blatant example of political cynicism to take the focus from their inherently corrupt regimes.
Instead of calling it out as it is like prime minister Sanchez, the Taoiseach would prefer to cravenly ratchet up the shamrogery and, on our behalf, distort our moral compass.
What enlightening times we live in.
It was harrowing to see the recent image of graves being dug in Iran for some 185 schoolchildren and their teachers.
That is an image that I think will last with lots of people, because many of us will think about our own children in that context, and it’s absolutely terrifying because, when we talk about war, we are talking about it in the abstract.
But that is the reality of military combat. That is the reality of what happens on the ground.
Despite technology, we have what war experts call collateral damage.
The fact is that we know that there are more than 1,000 people who are dead now — very many of them ordinary, innocent Iranian citizens.
Of course, there have been a lot of bad people taken out.
Nobody is shedding any tears for the now deceased leader who was a real bad individual.
It’s my contention that, at this stage, we are left with lots of questions.
The messaging from the White House has been all over the place.
We don’t know why exactly this was done. We don’t know when they will depart the scene. We don’t know what the fallout eventually is going to be.
It seems to me that perhaps the Trump administration spotted an opportunity to take out Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and took it.
Beyond that, there doesn’t seem to be a whole lot of forward planning.
There is no doubt that we are in a very difficult moment in time.
Despite all the complications, I would speculate that Donald Trump is not going to continue with this war for much longer.
I really hope that I am right.
Every generation seems to produce someone ready to declare opera and ballet irrelevant.
And yet, century after century, these art forms continue to endure — evolving, expanding, and moving audiences in ways few artistic traditions ever have.
In a recent interview hosted by , during a conversation between Timothée Chalamet and Matthew McConaughey, Chalamet openly mocked at why we should “keep this thing alive, even though no one cares about this anymore”.
It is the kind of reductive take one hears when popularity is mistaken for cultural value.
Opera and ballet have survived wars, revolutions, censorship, and centuries of cultural upheaval not because they are relics, but because they are among the most physically and emotionally demanding art forms humanity has ever created.
Opera singers train for decades to produce sound powerful enough to carry over a full orchestra in theatres designed centuries before amplification existed.
Ballet dancers push the limits of human anatomy until music itself seems to take physical form. These are not outdated art forms. They are living ones, constantly reinterpreted and continually evolving.
Entire communities of artists collaborate to bring them to life: Orchestras, conductors, composers, choreographers, designers, technicians, stage managers, and performers.
When it works, it moves audiences to tears without retakes, without CGI, and without editing — only human breath, bodies, and imagination.
Artists, of all people, should understand the devotion it takes to master an art form.
When they mock another discipline, they are not exposing its irrelevance — they are exposing their own ignorance. To dismiss another discipline is not criticism. It is a failure of artistic respect. Opera and ballet are not obsolete.
They remain among the most complex, disciplined, and beautiful artistic achievements our kind has ever produced.
What is outdated is the idea that art must be trendy to matter.
Opera and ballet have survived empires, wars, revolutions, and centuries of cultural change. I suspect they will survive a celebrity hot take too.
I am very pleased that a motion to dispense with the All-Ireland SHC preliminary quarter-finals was passed at the GAA’s annual congress last weekend.
Consequently, the Joe McDonagh finalists will no longer be fed into the “resuscitation programme” of the third-placed teams in both the Munster and Leinster senior championships.
With courtesy and respect for the man after whom the competition is named, the closing games of the Joe McDonagh Cup should now be played in the fitting context of opening matches at the quarter-final/semi-final stages of the senior hurling championship.
Thereafter, having won or lost, teams can celebrate and/or reflect on their achievements without the shadow of certain hurling demolition within days such as happened with all, bar one, McDonagh Cup winner over past seasons.
Understandably, the world’s attention at this time is focussed on events in Iran and the Middle East.
We deserve, nonetheless, to continue to pay attention to our own interests and our ability to protect them. Recent actions by Kremlin-backed actors in the Baltic and further afield cannot be dismissed as accidental or innocent:
- September 2022 — gas pipelines between Russia and Germany blown up;
- October 2023 — gas pipeline between Finland and Estonia ruptured;
- November 2024 — Data cable between Sweden and Lithuania severed;
- December 2024 — Data cable between Finland and Germany severed;
- December 2024 — Power cable between Finland and Estonia cut;
- January 2025 — Fibre-optic cable between Sweden and Latvia severed.
This sabotage happened close to Kremlin bases in St Petersburg and Kaliningrad, in closely monitored waters in the Gulf of Finland and the Baltic Sea.
Ireland’s waters, by contrast, are not studied in any way as closely, yet the cutting or damage of fuel or fibre-optic lines running undersea in our territorial waters would have dire consequences worldwide.
Recent undertakings to engage European allies in this defence, particularly during our six-month presidency of the European Commission, are welcome.
However, the threat will not disappear in January 2027.
Minister Helen McEntee is doing very positive things for our security and defence posture. Long may she continue.
