The autocratic style employed by the Taoiseach is
causing disquiet and he would do well to take stock before becoming his
government’s biggest liability, reports Special Correspondent Michael Clifford
WHO’S going to bring down the Government? Alan
Shatter? The former minister for justice is to appear on tonight’s Late, Late
Show, and is expected to be wielding a knife. Even if he is armed, precedent
suggests that any wound he may render will not be fatal.
What about Martin Callinan? The former garda
commissioner knows where one body is buried. Could Callinan reveal that, in
fact, the missive delivered to him the night before his resignation was the
metaphorical revolver and bottle of whiskey? If he was given the impression
that he better go before being pushed, then Kenny has a problem. Any taoiseach
seen to be acting above the law in such a manner would find his tenure in
office untenable.
What about Enda Kenny? Is it possible that the
biggest liability to Enda Kenny’s government is now the man himself?
The controversy over IMMA-gate (See, there’s
modern art for you. “I’m a gate”) reveals plenty about Kenny’s vulnerabilities
as a leader. His little plan to appoint Seanad nominee John McNulty to the
board of Irish Museum of Modern Art until the man’s election to the Upper House
in a few weeks’ time was, above all else, entirely stupid. Forget for a second
the contempt displayed towards the museum. (Would alpha male Enda ever show the
same level of contempt to a sporting body?).
Leave aside the laughable pledge to be
transparent about State board appointments.
Ignore the hypocrisy of using the Seanad to
raise McNulty’s profile ahead of the general election, after he attempted to
abolish the House on the basis that it was cynically being used for that
purpose.
Pretend that Kenny actually gives a fig about
gender imbalance, when he ignored the three female candidates nominated by the
party to fill the Seanad seat in order to install McNulty. Just leave aside all
that the above says about Kenny. More than anything else, the ploy was plain
stupid.
Comparisons have been made with Fianna Fáil’s
reputation as strokers, but this is wide of the mark. No Fianna Fáil leader
would ever have been as stupid as that.
How did Kenny think he’d get away with it? When
the smoke cleared on the stroke, disgruntled bodies were lying all over the
place, in the arts community, within his own party, and among those concerned
with gender balance in politics. It was inevitable that it would get out.
Apart from that, he didn’t even do his
research. A board member for IMMA is precluded by internal rules from running
for election. McNulty acknowledged this yesterday when he announced his
resignation from the board. By the way, how will IMMA survive the loss of this
valued director, who did so much for its sustainability through all the days he
was a member of the board?
Kenny is not stupid. He has issues with
grasping detail of policy but, since assuming the leadership of Fine Gael, he
compensated for any such shortcomings by displaying a sound political antenna.
No more, though. The power appears to have gone
to his head. When asked by RTÉ’s Catriona Perry in Rhode Island on Tuesday
evening why he hadn’t selected one of the three women nominated for the Seanad
run, he replied: “It’s the right of the leader of the day to decide who should
be nominated.”
So he did it because he can do it, because it’s
his right to do it, rather than for any discernible reason beyond base
politics. He did it because he’s the top dog. He did it and he made a hames of
it.
When a leader reaches that stage of remove, he
or she had better be equipped with serious political ability, the kind of
ability that Kenny has yet to display. This, after all, is a Taoiseach who
rarely submits himself to interview, or even debate during election or
referendum campaigns.
Some of his sloppiness can be put down to a thinning
of the ranks in his praetorian guard. No longer is Big Phil around to tell him
what to do, or Alan Shatter to dazzle with his advice, or even James Reilly,
who’s off sulking after being shafted from the Department of Health.
Kenny’s other problem is rumbling among the
backbenches. On Wednesday, at the parliamentary party meeting, up to 15 members
expressed disquiet at the affair. This in a party where dissent is barely
tolerated under Kenny’s leadership.
“People are becoming disgusted by the way Fine
Gael is run,” Fine Gael TD John Deasy told yesterday’s News At One, referencing
the meeting. “We’ve a Taoiseach who likes to give his mobile phone number out
to the world but doesn’t engage with criticism.”
Notwithstanding Deasy’s reputation as a maverick
under Kenny, his comments may well have struck a chord in the party ranks. The
autocratic style employed by Kenny can be traced back to the attempted heave
against him in 2010, when the alleged bright boys in the party rebelled against
his shortcomings, and lost. Since then, Kenny has neutered any criticism of his
style or substance, but the IMMA-gate affair has shown up glaring shortcomings,
not to mention a complete disregard for any political integrity he claimed to
possess.
“The calculation from the Taoiseach is that he
can do pretty much anything he wants right now,” Deasy told RTÉ. “Because as
long as the economy improves, people won’t care, and maybe he’s right.”
Maybe he is, but there’s only so much political
capital that can be frittered away by any leader. Kenny would want to take
stock, or he might become a liability, just like those he shoved overboard when
he perceived them to no longer be worth retaining
Michael Clifford
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