Inside File: Boeing, Boeing gone?

By Ray O’Hanlon

There was word going around Ireland last week that Aer Lingus has already been sold. “IF” is wary of rumors, but this one had more legs than most. It was being widely suggested that a deal had been secretly struck but that it would not become public for up to a year and certainly not until after Aer Lingus battles through its painful process of staff cuts and certainly not until after the upcoming general election.

The Irish government owns 95 percent of Aer Lingus — the employees own the rest — and it wouldn’t look good for the government to be seen washing its hands of the “national airline” in such hard-pressed times. Various names were being linked with this silent auction. One of them was former phone magnate Denis O’Brien, who is rumored to be buying everything in the world other than outer Mongolia.

British Airways, a partner with Aer Lingus in the oneworld alliance, was also in the frame again.

The heightened sale rumor was to be expected, as were the denials from Aer Lingus brass. Such things always fly when the you-know-what is hitting the propeller. And in Aer Lingus — where a newly aggressive approach to mixing it up with upstarts like Ryanair — it is doing just that right now with the kind of thrust you would expect from a Pratt & Whitney jet engine.

Industrial unrest has been in the air at Aer Lingus for some time and it seems set to get worse. At the same time, Ryanair, the airline that will probably have passengers flying the plane someday in order to save costs on pilot pay, seems intent on buying up the entire inventory of the Boeing aircraft company. All in all, many changes in Irish aviation are coming down the runway. For one thing, the Shannon stopover looks like a goner in the face of the EU’s apparent intent to eliminate the kind of bilateral air deals between individual EU members and the U.S. that allow for such localized consideration.

Really, you would think that flying the Atlantic would become an easier proposition over time. But between terrorists armed with pilots licenses, foot and mouth, recession, industrial action, cutthroat competition, mergers and the lack of same, not to mention tinkering eurocrats, it’s a wonder we’re not all jumping back into the cowhide boat with old St. Brendan.

Questions in Florida

There may have been more to that recent MacBride Principles affair in Florida than meets the eye. Why would Gov. Jeb Bush, who is running for reelection in November, preside over a move against MacBride? Certainly, it would seem curious that Bush would knowingly sanction an end to his state’s MacBride statue in an election year. There are no votes in simply upholding MacBride, but there would certainly be votes to lose — Irish American and Catholic in general — if the statute was scrapped.

So did Bush even know that the State Board of Administration, of which he is chairman, was intent on knocking out MacBride on the grounds that it was an impediment to investment on behalf of the state’s pension fund system?

Bush did not rise to the defense of the board’s attempted action when it was assailed by various Irish-American groups. That was left to its executive director, Tom Herndon. Herndon wrote Fr. Sean McManus of the Irish National Caucus after McManus pulled the pin from his rhetorical grenade and rolled it down I-95 with the charge that the anti-MacBride move was effectively anti-Catholic.

Herndon complained in a response to McManus that over the last 13 years, the board had “never identified an instance of non-compliance” with MacBride. Now before someone yells “Ford,” think of it: Why might there be no instance of non-compliance evident to the board? Could it be that the MacBride Principles have been an effective deterrent to such non-compliance? And if that’s the case, why would you want to ditch them?

The board/Herndon’s position on MacBride is either nanve, disingenuous or illogical. And as for its position that it should be allowed maximum room to invest while being, as Herndon put it, “free from political influence,” well, freedom has its price. Florida’s pension fund is out by $109 million because it invested in Enron, a company that clearly could have done with a few principles of its own.

Colombia confusion

Oops, looks like there a bit of strain in the special relationship over the Colombia affair and the detention of three Irishmen by the Colombian government. According to a report in the Irish Independent, an independent forensic consultant has cast serious doubt on prosecution evidence linking the three Irish nationals — all with links to the republican movement — to explosive substances.

The case against Martin McCauley, Niall Connolly and James Monaghan rests heavily on forensic tests carried out in the U.S. Embassy in Bogota and the evidence of what the Colombian government says are defectors from the FARC guerrilla group.

“But much of the published statements from the defectors is already facing a problem with credibility after being challenged by the men’s defense lawyers,” the Indo reported.

“An examination of the scientific evidence by a British consultant, Dr. Keith Borer, on behalf of the defense, has disputed the U.S. finding and concluded: “On the current evidence, it is my opinion that it is unlikely the three defendants were contaminated with explosives as suggested.”

The Indo reported Borer as saying he found that none of the tested samples had been close to a recently fired gun or residue from one.

Some might recall the Birmingham Six case, where it was eventually revealed that the Irishmen arrested had been playing cards on a train shortly before they were arrested. The laminated surface of many playing card sets can leave a residue on the fingers similar to that found in some explosives. Perhaps the whole Colombia affair less to do with gun running as it has to do with gin rummy in an odd place. Then again, perhaps not.

Meanwhile, the Colombian government claims that Niall Connolly, Sinn FTin’s plenipotentiary to Havana, was illegally training FARC guerrillas in January 2001. But two TDs, Jim O’Keefe of Fine Gael and Ben Briscoe of Fianna F_il, have now stated that they were in Havana as part of a delegation that month and met with Connolly. That would seem to suggest that Colombian prosecutors will have to be very specific about the dates during which Connolly was allegedly lurking in the Colombian jungle with ill intent.