Sports washing
The potential takeover of Man Utd by a Qatari investment fund raises many ethical issues and consequently fans are ambivalent about this development. lt would bring very significant financial benefits, clearing the club of debt and facilitating much-needed infrastructure improvements. It would also help to fund a squad that could compete with Man City which is already financed by oil-rich Sheikhs. However, this remuneration must be considered against the numerous human rights violations perpetrated by the Qataris. This is of course a sports washing exercise on behalf of the Qataris which, if expedited, will severely tarnish the reputation of the club.
On the plus side the Premier League has increased its ownership requirements via its so-called ‘stringent’ owners and directors test. Under this convention anyone found guilty of human rights abuses will be ineligible to own a club. Thus, any potential Qatari purchaser should not be connected to the country’s sovereign wealth fund – in the same way that the Saudi state was not involved in the purchase of Newcastle by the Saudi Private Investment Fund (PIF). It is, nevertheless, instructive to question how this principle works in practice. For example, in the case of Newcastle, the league stated that it had been given legally binding, categorical assurances that the PIF was autonomous from the state. However, the PIF declared in a US court recently that it was in fact a sovereign instrument of the Kingdom. This self-serving declaration allowed it to avoid testifying in the PGA v LIV golf antitrust case. The Saudi state’s assurances of non-ownership of the club would thus seem as worthless as Tik Tok’s claim that the social media company operates independently from the Chinese government. It thus remains unclear if new bids from the Qatari or Saudi sovereign wealth funds would be blocked by the rule changes. The above safeguards are toothless. Unless specific individuals can be linked to identifiable human rights abuses and barred from ownership they will seemingly make little difference.
Sky’s Succession with its tale of unfettered avarice is pertinent to this unedifying situation. The hapless character Greg when faced with doing a “deal with the devil” proclaims that he has no use for his “soul”. The soul of Man Utd, in contrast, is not dispensable and should not be up for sale to the Qataris. It stretches from the Busby Babes through to the holy trinity of Law, Best and Charlton. More recently we have the fabulously successful Ferguson era which was initially spawned by the legendary Eric Cantona and culminated with United winning the Premiership, FA Cup and European Cup in the same season. To quote Roman, another Succession character, Utd should tell the Qataris “to stick their petro-dollars up their human rights record”. Busby would definitely approve..
GEORGE WORKMAN
Donabate, Co Dublin
Conduct of elections on polling day
The worst instance I ever saw was in north Belfast. A frail, old man entered the polling station holding his polling card and just stood there, right beside the door. He was crying, and he sighed: “What do I do now?” Poor soul, he was ballot fodder – people used/abused by and for the sake of ‘the party’.
The Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe, OSCE, observes elections all over Europe, and it was here for the Northern Ireland elections in 2003. No wonder it recommended “…the law should be amended to restrict campaign activity on election day or to prohibit such activities [both inside and] within a certain distance from the entrance to the polling station.”
In most OSCE-monitored elections, party agents are not allowed to know the identity of an individual voter (although of course some locals will recognise their neighbours); they are certainly not given any access to the marked register.
In Northern Ireland, however, if and when a party agent is present, the identity number of each voter is often announced out loud. This is permitted here but not in many other jurisdictions; not even in Russia, for example. What happens next, here, is actually illegal... but it happens nevertheless: the agent passes data on who has and who has not voted to other activists outside the polling station, and the latter then drive off to round up any ‘stragglers’, old, sick, whatever. This practice is horrible. It was happening in 2003. It was still happening last year.
With the 2023 local elections just weeks away, a recent appeal by two party leaders and others in society to the EONI and the Electoral Commission reiterated the above recommendation. As far as is known, neither has reacted in any way at all.
PETER EMERSON
Director, the de Borda Institute
Belfast BT14
DUP/TUV do not appreciate ‘soft power’
Whether you’re for or against Joe Biden there was one clear ‘take-away’ from his visit. The gap between the DUP/ TUV-ers and the progressive members of the ‘unionist community’ (young and older) grows and is becoming a chasm.
The DUP/TUV-ers complain like juveniles out of their depth, aligning themselves with the right- wing little Englanders on flags on cars, irrational claims of meddling, hatred and snubs, a presidential gaffe and a 19th century-type cartoon which some would regard as racist.
With their fingers on the pulse of a skeleton, they fail to appreciate ‘soft power’, genuine links with the massive Irish diaspora and the work that goes on behind the scenes and beyond such visits.
Their world is small. The rest of us should move on together, embracing our place and enjoying the benefits of Europe while facing the real world of 21st century challenges.
DR BILLY LEONARD
Former MLA, Kilkee, Co Clare
Betterment of Irish people
The gradual pulling away from a benign political sense of national patriotism towards the citizens of this state first began when Ireland joined what is today called the EU.
Since the mid-1970s there has been the constant drum-beating from successive governments that we are firstly European and secondly Irish. Even our foremost Dáil leaders have consistently claimed this allegiance to the EU bloc which, over time, has led to a casual carelessness in home governance.
We are led to always believe that Brussels knows best on matters of vital interest to the country, with the after taste of the citizenry left feeling more should be done at national level.
We see this political lack of effort in areas such as an overall responsibility in housing and health and employment policies, where the focus has shifted away from what is best for the Irish, to what is best for Europe. We seem to have lost a cohesion regarding the correct way forward for the betterment of the Irish people. Irish politicians appear directed to a place whereby the overall control of the population has become the primary function of individual governments within the EU. This unelected ‘world economic forum’ way of political thinking is an unhealthy way to proceed.
ROBERT SULLIVAN
Bantry, Co Cork
