Irish Political News

Having mentioned the crisis that is emerging in Serbia the week before last I was actually slightly surprised at the speed with which events have moved over the intervening time.

Only yesterday it was announced that:

NATO PLACED the Kosovan town of Mitrovica under de facto military law yesterday after riots by a Serb population hostile to independence killed one UN policeman and forced the pull-out of UN personnel.

The Nato-led peacekeeping force K-For and the United Nations mission ordered all local Kosovo Serb police officers to park their patrol cars and suspend normal duties.

With UN police already withdrawn, the order left French, Belgian and Spanish troops in sole control of law and order in the northern slice of Kosovo, where Serbs opposed to its February 17th secession from Serbia dominate the population.

“We have not organised martial law,” K-For commander Gen Xavier Bout de Marnhac told a news conference in the capital, Pristina. “There is no intent as far as I know for installing it for the time being.” He said Monday’s riots had “crossed a red line with the deliberate intent to kill people, you know Molotov cocktails, fragmentation grenades and direct fire” aimed at UN and K-For personnel.

But this is nowhere near a surprise for a week or so ago we learned that:

SERB PRESIDENT Boris Tadic is poised to call a snap general election after a government comprising his allies and those of nationalist prime minister Vojislav Kostunica collapsed due to disputes over Kosovo and ties with the European Union.

Mr Kostunica refuses to deal with Brussels until it denounces Kosovo’s recent declaration of independence, while the more moderate Mr Tadic says Serbia must not let its opposition to the region’s sovereignty derail its own bid for EU membership.

This is bad bad news. As already noted the Radical Party is waiting in the wings, and the possibility of a link up between an even stronger RP - energised by these events - and Kostinuca’s Democratic Party is not beyond question. I don’t think, again as previously noted, that that would necessarily mean a slide towards catastrophe (indeed, hey, one of the best ways of showing up the shallowness of any nationalist programme is to get a self-avowed nationalist party into power - but generally that works in more stable democracies. Not an experiment I’d have any enthusiasm for in a Serbia bowed and bloody after a decade and half of various pressures), but it could be, at the very least a hairy time ahead. All the more so because their room for movement on Kosovo, etc is so limited. And the idea of a festering Serbia is not good.

“All parties want Serbia to join the EU, but the question is how - with or without Kosovo,” said Mr Kostunica. “There was no united [ cabinet] will to clearly and loudly state that Serbia can continue its path toward the EU only with Kosovo.” The prime minister has tried to portray the president as being too soft on the West and too quick to accept the “loss” of a historically and culturally important part of Serbia.

In the general election, Mr Kostunica’s party is expected to play the patriotic card and depict itself as the true defenders of Serb interests everywhere, including Kosovo; Mr Tadic’s party, on the other hand, is likely to claim that both parties are equally opposed to a sovereign Kosovo, but differ over whether Serbia should now isolate itself from the West.

And note how internal political dynamics reflect external political pressures resulting in even those with more moderate voices tilting towards the extremes.

“Kosovo is of course an integral part of our country,” Mr Tadic said. “I believe the issue is that the Serbian government does not have a united position over European and economic perspectives of Serbia and its citizens.”

Still, again as with these things, let’s not get too idealistic about Serbian nationalism, or indeed the reality of power politics. For note the following.

Mr Kostunica’s Democratic Party of Serbia, along with the Socialists and the Radicals - who are Serbia’s most popular single party - favour a closer relationship with Russia to offset a cooling of relations with Brussels and Washington.

In what was perceived as a “thank you” for Moscow’s support on the issue of Kosovo, Mr Kostunica recently sold most of Serbia’s state oil firm to Kremlin-controlled energy giant Gazprom, for a price that allies of Mr Tadic called a fraction of its real value.

So, beyond talk of ‘imperialism’ let’s just note that all the regional hegemons have an agenda, and that within the Serbian polity there are those who equally comfortable to align with whatever agendas are on offer. And whether those links are borne of cultural and historic precedent they are something that could easily have been predicted as gaining energy in a post-Kosovo secession period.

Meanwhile back at the interface…

Kosovo Serb leaders, who refuse to accept the authority of the fledgling state’s ethnic-Albanian government, bemoaned the infighting in Belgrade.

“This move just shows the irresponsibility of the political elite in Belgrade,” said prominent nationalist Milan Ivanovic.

“Instead of joining ranks toward solving the most important issue - preserving Kosovo within Serbia - they seem to call for anarchy.”

And the trouble on the ground really kicked off over the last week or so.

KOSOVO SERBS attacked United Nations police and Nato troops with guns, grenades and petrol bombs in the ethnically divided town of Mitrovica yesterday, in clashes that injured more than 100 people and fuelled fears of further violence.

While the European Union and Nato blamed Serb extremists for the fighting, Belgrade accused international peacekeepers and police of using excessive force in Mitrovica and said it was discussing an appropriate response with its main ally, Russia.

This latest series of events followed on from:

Riots erupted when about 100 police officers stormed and retook a UN courthouse in Mitrovica that had been seized last Friday by Serbs who were angered by Kosovo’s western-backed declaration of independence a month ago.

The police arrested 53 people who were occupying the courthouse, but were set upon by a Serb mob when they drove them away for questioning.

This, almost as if in a mathematical equation led to the events of the last couple of days:

A Ukrainian police officer serving with the United Nations died overnight of injuries sustained in the riots. Polish, French and Ukrainian officers were among 42 UN police and 22 K-For soldiers injured.

The violence was the worst since Kosovo’s Albanian majority declared independence and highlighted the risk of the new state’s partition along ethnic lines.

And while this has been an expression on the ground, politically the rhetoric has ratcheted up as well.

Serbia’s minister for Kosovo, Slobodan Samardzic, said the “brutal” international forces had broken a pledge not to use force to evict the occupiers of the UN courthouse.

“This is what they have done to us. We’ll pay them back,” he told a crowd in Mitrovica, which is divided between Albanians on the southern side of the Ibar river and Serbs on the northern bank. It has been a regular flashpoint for ethnic violence, most recently during deadly riots that erupted exactly four years ago yesterday.

And this is echoed across a range of people…

Serb prime minister Vojislav Kostunica accused international forces in Kosovo of “implementing a policy of force against Serbia”, and said Belgrade and Russia were discussing how to stop “all forms of violence against Kosovo Serbs”.

Tomislav Nikolic, whose ultra-nationalist Radical Party is Serbia’s most popular, accused UN police and Nato soldiers of “brutal and savage” acts reminiscent of those which “Hitler’s occupying regime carried out against Serbs” during the second World War.

Dangerous talk, and self-serving too, but there is a political end. As Ian Traynor notes in the Guardian…

The riots come as the EU prepares to steer Kosovo to statehood while Serbia gears up for elections after the Kosovo crisis brought down the government in Belgrade. Serbia is planning to extend its national and municipal elections in May to the Serb areas of Kosovo, a move the Albanians and international diplomats see as an attempt to partition Kosovo. Serbia has not staged municipal elections in Kosovo since the UN takeover and to do so would breach the security council resolution mandating the international mission.

“The concern is that the aim is to further Serbia’s links with the Serb-majority areas of Kosovo and set up parallel institutions,” said a European diplomat. “That would seriously undermine Kosovo statehood.”

Surely, but from a Serbian perspective it would retain the all important links into Kosovo. And yet again it points up the bankruptcy of the previous agenda prosecuted by the EU and the US. Because if ever a problem was unamenable to the sort of zero-sum thinking we’ve seen displayed here it is that of Kosovo.

And while it is true that the reality that Mr. Ivanovic must face is that Kosovo is now lost to Serbia (although perhaps there may be some redrawing of maps at the borders) there is a painful corollary that Serbia is - potentially - lost to Europe for some time to come. At least it is in the absence of the EU and the US sitting down and rethinking what has come before.
In recent weeks commentators have been blowing hot about positive outcomes from future elections in Serbia and consider the following quotes:

Slovenian foreign minister Dimitrij Rupel, whose country holds the EU’s presidency, said he saw “encouraging signs” that pro-EU parties would win the election.

“To be quite frank, I don’t think there is any other possibility for our Serbian friends than the European Union,” he said. “Where else should they go?”

The EU’s external relations commissioner, Benita Ferrero-Waldner, said it was time to offer Serbs a sign of Brussels’s commitment to forging closer ties with Belgrade. “What we have to do is to show the Serbian population that we want them in the European Union,” she said of EU proposals for phasing out visas for Serbs travelling to the EU, more scholarships for Serb students and better EU-Serbia transport links.

But this is close to wishful thinking. It might come to pass. But there is no certainty that it will come to pass.

Polls suggest the election will, like several recent presidential and parliamentary ballots, boil down to a close battle between the Democrats and their allies and the Radicals, who are currently the biggest single party in parliament.

Mr Kostunica and the DSS are likely to come third in the election and again be cast in the role of kingmaker, forcing the premier to choose between giving support to extreme nationalists or liberals.

But what if Kostunica does choose the nationalists? Then the point made by the Slovenian foreign minister becomes moot. As already argued here, a sullen Serbian state, disconnected from a Europe that a significant section of its populace considers to have (at the least) assisted in the delivery of an historic defeat is arguably going to be quite content in the short term to remain aloof. It is possible that the Russians can take up some of the slack, although nowhere near enough. And that merely prolongs a dismal situation for the Serbian people.

‘NOW, what I want is, Facts. Teach these boys and girls nothing but Facts. Facts alone are wanted in life. Plant nothing else, and root out everything else. You can only form the minds of reasoning animals upon Facts: nothing else will ever be of any service to them. This is the principle on which I bring up my own children, and this is the principle on which I bring up these children. Stick to Facts, sir!’

Some people are never happy. Patricia McKenna, writing in today’s Irish Times (sub req’d), laments the fact that the Referendum Commission, when establish in advance of the Lisbon Treaty vote, will not be providing pro and anti-Treaty arguments to the public and will be restricted to making neutral statements about the Treaty. McKenna’s argument, to my mind, seems a little confused. She reminds us - rightly - of the importance of the principle won in her Supreme Court case, that

A more recent argument against the Treaty put forward by Libertas is that it makes the Irish Constitution subordinate to EU law. The basis for this? The clause in the referendum bill which states that

There’s nothing like a dispute in a foreign territory away to get people talking. And with Kosovo/Kosova we have a doozy. Usually reliable and/or informative commentators are worried. We’ve phrases such as ‘gangster state’ being thrown around. The Empire is seen at work. NATO intervention. Minority rights. National identity. And worst of all the unpleasant sense that whatever decision is taken is the wrong one.

So we learn that the European Union is split between those who recognised Kosovo in the first hours after it’s independence and those who appear unlikely to. The split is predictable. Spain - cogniscent of it’s own centrifugal dynamic - is unlikely to recognise, although the EU with gnomic diplomacy has engineered an approach which allows for Kosovo to become a European protectorate and EU states to develop bilateral relationships as and when they see fit.

Putin at his marathon press conference before the weekend rather unfortunately likened the situation to the United Kingdom and Northern Ireland (an unhappy comparison on so many levels and to so many people):

Speaking at his annual press conference in the Kremlin - his last before stepping down as president in May - Putin insisted that Kosovo did not deserve special status. “I don’t want to say anything that would offend anyone, but for 40 years northern Cyprus has practically had independence. Why aren’t you recognising that? Aren’t you ashamed, Europeans, for having these double standards?” he said.

He went on: “Why do we promote separatism? For 400 years Great Britain has been fighting for its territorial integrity in respect of Northern Ireland. Why not? Why don’t you support that?” he asked a journalist from German TV.

Well… when he puts it that way…

Still, as noted by Tracy Wilkinson for the Los Angeles Times, on To the Point (KCRW) ‘they won’t be [an independent nation] for quite some time.’ Expectations are ‘unrealistically high’ as to what independence might mean. And ‘Serbs are angry and humiliated by this’.

Remember, this is unilateral. But one doubts that it would happen if the US didn’t want it.

A further point. Nothing makes me more unhappy than to hear how Kosovo is somehow predestined to be a gangster state - or already is. This discourse seems to me to be all too similar to that used by some antagonistic to Palestinian self-determination who argue that they are ‘not ready’ and that such readiness will arrive at some ill-defined future point in time. I think this is problematic on so many readings. Failed and emerging states are per definition going to tilt towards ‘gangsterism’ of one form or another. This is neither news nor particularly relevant one way or another. What is disturbing is that it seems to be used as a way of further implying that they are somehow not worth of self-determination.

This is compounded by the basis for arguing that Serbian sovereignty should remain unbroken. Kosovo is the well spring of the Serbian nation. Well, indeed, it may be, or it may not be. But for materialists to tread on such metaphysical ground or to give it any credence whatsoever is remarkable. This is not to say that one should not acknowledge such thinking and the power of such thinking. Nationalism is problematic for socialists (and it’s hardly news that the opposite is also true). On the one hand the enormous energies that it unleashes are looked on with both distrust and envy by many of us on the left. On the other it’s not really part of the solution - is it? It’s a sort of cul-de-sac. We admire its ability to marshall societal energy. But we’re not happy about the destination it often seems to be taking that society. And as even the most shallow reading of Benedict Anderson or Tim Edensor will indicate it is more problematic still in that it leads to competing calls for self-determination which cut right across the egalitarian axes of socialist thinking. How to choose? Who to choose?

And I find it interesting that people turn into the most hard-nosed of pragmatists when it comes to Kosovo. This is hugely problematic because it generally leaves little room for movement when it comes to arguing against the equal and entirely cynical pragmatism of the various powers hovering around the issue. After all, bad and all as the Empire is, it’s hardly by basing its position in pragmatism and self-evident self interest acting in a way which is much different from those arguing the opposite point of view.

Yet, that said, this is also a massive failure by the European Union. A failure in so much as it has not been willing - or able - to contemplate or execute a new approach to sovereignty in these cases. It’s not that one ’side’ or another is right. Or that one claim or another has a greater validity. The basic problem is that both claims are valid, both sides have a palpable legitimacy. There is a case for Albanian self-determination. There is an equal case for Serbian connections.

So, why have people been forced to choose between the two positions? Why has it not been possible to accept that sovereignty within the EU is going to be a compromise, a web of inter-relationships. We already have something of that on the land border between the Republic of Ireland and the United Kingdom. Northern Ireland is approaching a sui generis consocietational status. Sovereignty is no longer indivisible but is explicitly divisible, not merely between the UK and the North, but between the North and the Republic of Ireland. Overlaps develop. Pooling and sharing takes place. These are only small steps, and these are also early days, so we have yet to discover their efficacy, but they sit within structures and agreements already forged within the European Union. And surely that sort of approach - one where sovereignty could be shared in some fashion to safeguard the rights of Serbs within Kosovo and the access to that heartland - was worth pursuing. Consider too that the Serbian government actually made some reasonably flexible proposals including one rooted in ‘one nation, two systems’. Some sort of inversion of that, ‘two overlapping nations’, could perhaps have been explored further.

This is, of course, largely academic now. Kosovo becomes de facto the latest addition to the Union. That’s not necessarily the worst option (so far). But so will Serbia at some point in the future, and it seems perverse that dilution or merging or overlapping of sovereignty could not occur prior to their accession when it will afterwards as they settle in the embrace of the common European homeland. Of course that is to ignore, to some extent, the very real limitations of the European project, limitations on sovereignty and suchlike which mean that for the forseable future we will have a confederation of states rather than a truly federal structure.

And beyond the hyperbole there is a useful article in the Irish Times which punctures some of the expectations and beliefs on either side. Dr. Aidan Hehir notes that:

In reality, Sunday’s declaration has not fundamentally altered the distribution of power in Kosovo nor will it precipitate a chain reaction of secession. Beyond the superficialities of flags and diplomatic gestures, recent developments in Kosovo are far less transformative than they have been portrayed.

On what basis is Kosovo now independent? Serbia’s authority and jurisdiction have been formally repealed but it is clear that the new “state” will have few of the traditional trappings of sovereignty. In key respects the ruling structure has been reconfigured but the paternalistic relationship between Kosovo’s rulers and the Kosovars themselves persists.

Crucially:

Kosovo has for centuries been subject to external governance in various guises. This disjuncture in the relationship between Kosovo’s inhabitants and its rulers characterised the period of Yugoslavia’s existence but persisted after Nato’s intervention in 1999 when the province was governed by the United Nations Mission in Kosovo.

While the UN did establish local political institutions, ultimate authority was exercised by the unelected international administrators. The UN mission wielded extensive power over all aspects of the political system and economy in Kosovo while the local population continued to be subjects of power exercised beyond their control.

Hehir points to the intriguing fact that as recently as 2004 the Kosovars were rioting against the UN and Nato. That the situation has changed is clear. Pristina must be one of the few places on the planet where the Stars and Stripes is waved entirely without any discernable irony. But the declaration of the Republic is, at best, lacking in substance.

The “independence” Kosovo now enjoys, however, constitutes a very similar configuration of power to that exercised since 1999. According to a report by the International Commission on the Balkans, Kosovo has, since its declaration of independence, moved into a period of “guided sovereignty”. This involves the transfer of control from the UN to the EU and an accelerated focus on “EU member state building”.

The final stage in Kosovo’s guided evolution is described as “shared sovereignty”, when Kosovo will become a full member of the EU. One might well ask, “At what stage in this evolution is Kosovo just ’sovereign’?” Membership of the EU is not presented as an option to be accepted or rejected by the “independent” state of Kosovo but a requirement determined by the international administrators. No state has ever had so many conditions and constraints imposed upon its independence.

This latter point is important too. If, as the EU argues, Kosovo is genuinely sui generis (although their reasoning for that is due to the break up of the FRY) then it appears odd that sui generis structures could not have been established between Serbia and Kosovo. A shared or joint sovereignty as a transitional step towards the EU might have addressed some of the issues and perhaps prepared the ground for a future breakup. It certainly would have dealt with a key aspect which was the remarkable trajectory of Kosovo from autonomous region to nation by slowing the pace of that change.

And, in a pattern replicating itself across the Balkans, we see that ‘the the newly “independent” state will be governed by an international civilian representative, Pieter Feith.

This international administrator will have the power to “take the actions necessary to oversee and ensure successful implementation of the settlement” and may “correct or annul decisions by Kosovo public authorities”. This of course significantly compromises Kosovo’s independence. The people of Kosovo have no authority to elect or remove the international representative and will be powerless to resist his decisions. This political structure does not equate with the legal definition of sovereignty and clearly compromises any notion of “independence”.

An interesting species of independence, is it not? And Hehir points to the reality that since there is no agreed international recognition Kosovo will assume a half-life similar to Taiwan.

Recent developments in Kosovo constitute an aberration, born of a unique confluence of factors. The exceptional nature of Kosovo’s recognition and the superficiality of its newly acquired independence will likely conspire to generate more problems in the future as other separatist groups decry the international community’s hypocrisy and the Kosovars realise that their newly declared “independence” does not mean independence per se.

Beyond the talk of ‘gangster states’ this is the reality. A Kosovo which will have limited sovereignty. Sovereignty which in no way is equal to other states and is unlikely to become so for quite some while. A Serbia which is profoundly unhappy about this situation where the governing elites have already compromised with the EU and the US and whose political stability remains unpredictable. The torching of Kosovar border posts by Serbs (from within Kosovo if the reports are to be believed) is predictable. If it is contained, well and good, but the fundamentals do not bode well.

Surely, if the EU represents anything positive it really has to address this. While Kosovo remains constrained there is - perhaps - room to rework this dispensation preparatory to future accession. To recognise that neither self-determination or historical or cultural links must in an of themselves be mutually contradictory or prevent genuinely imaginative ways forward.

It’s a great headline to the story that yesterday’s Green Party conference failed to agree a position of either opposing or supporting the forthcoming Lisbon Treaty. It is pretty clear that the majority of Green Party delegates decided to back the party leadership’s call for a Yes vote. Whether it was because they felt that as a party in government they had to do so, or because they had a road to Damascus conversion on the issue like the previously vehemently EU-critical Deirdre de Burca (She wasn’t a Senator then of course), or simply because that always substantial section of the party that supported both Nice referendums and was generally more in line with the European Green movement, now commands a majority.

The Greens are calling for plaudits for the fact that they had an open debate and reached a decision democratically. Leaving aside Gormley’s imaginative interpretation of that vote I suppose, grudgingly, one must acknowledge as much though frankly attempting to lecture other political parties for not doing the same kind of misses the point. No left-wing party would need to debate opposition to Lisbon any more than it would need to debate support for public services or opposition to privatisation. Basic left principles such as support for democracy, opposition to neo-liberalism, opposition to centralisation of unaccountable power and so on make opposing the Treaty a bit of a no-brainer.

It will be interesting to see the practical implications of this for the party though. Since the Green Party does not have a position, can Green Party staff issue press releases in support of the Treaty when they’re supposed to be working for a party that has no position on it? Can the Green Party TDs and Senators use Green Party premises to conduct their Yes campaigning? And as for the No campaign, what organisation or vehicle will they use to advance their arguments? A number are involved already on a personal level in the Campaign Against the EU Constitution, which I am told will be changing its name because the EU has decided to change the name of the document, does this mean they will now move into that structure or will they established a Greens Against Lisbon grouping of some sort?

There might be some suggestion that the Yes side has been undermined by the failure of the Green leadership to get two-third on Saturday, but I’m not so sure. It’s pretty clear that the Green leadership, for whatever reason, carried the bulk of their membership with them and are likely to carry the bulk of Green voters come the referendum. The loss of the Green Party’s organisational muscle is a negligible one. The Greens don’t have the money at the minute to run a major campaign and in both Nice referendums their work on the ground was pretty weak. Where they were key in previous referendums was that in Gormley especially, but also De Burca and McKenna, they had articulate, experienced and educated debaters to be rolled out on the media who could argue for a No vote without being republicans, socialists or working class and scaring middle Ireland too much.

Meanwhile, among the anti-Treaty campaigns, there has been some frustration that the SWP has established another front entity to campaign against the Lisbon Treaty while aleady being affiliated to the Campaign Against the EU Constitution, established a couple of years ago when the EU Constitution was first being put forward. Happily, in a remarkable display of honesty for one of the most duplicitous political entities in Ireland, the SWP has altered the site since it was first put up to acknowledge that the people identified behind it, Kieran Allen and Sinead Kennedy, are both members of the Socialist Workers Party. Still, there is some ill-feeling that they went ahead off their own bat without consulting other people in the CAEUC.

Also of interest is that it is the SWP that has both established the website and it affiliated to the CAEUC. Firstly, the SWP’s affiliation to the CAEUC is quite a recent one, and as late as early last year a prominent member of the SWP told me they honestly didn’t see the EU Constitution/Lisbon Treaty issue as a priority. Certainly SWP activists were noticeable by their absence from early CAEUC meetings. Yet here we have them setting up a website, publishing a pamphlet outlining he reasons for a No vote, describing it as a key priority in their New Year’s message and affiliating to the CAEUC. Curiously, there is no reference to People Before Profit, their previous electoral front group. The PBP website has not been updated for several months and seems to have no position, good, bad or indifferent, on the Lisbon Treaty. Considering the use that could be made by the SWP out of Lisbon for attracting people to the organisation, it’s a slight surprise to me they’re being upfront about who they are in the campaign and not using the PBP brand.

But more frustrating than the SWP playing ’silly buggers’ has been the annoyance felt by many, and ably pointed out by Daily Mail columnist Joe Higgins in last Thursday’s Irish Times, about the media’s appointment of Dermot Ganley as head of the anti-Treaty movement in Ireland. Ganley, and his Libertas movement, with no track record on Europe at all, has come from almost nowhere at the start of December to being seen as a key played in the Lisbon Treaty debate. Libertas certainly has money, but no actual organisation as such, though it’s clearly got some smart people doing the media. But Higgins rightly points out that the media, and the Irish Times in particular, has been doing what it can to portray the anti-Treaty campaigns and groups, predominantly left-wing or progressive in Ireland, as right-wing or even fascist. It’s what the media tried to do in both Nice referendums, successfully in the latter case.

But the reason for the Dermot Ganley love-fest has two other aspects. Firstly, if Ganley is the leader of the No campaign, then no other organisation or individual can be leader. With Sinn Féin the only substantial political party to be opposing the Treaty and, at this point in time, the only serious political organisation to be opposing it, the media would find it difficult to avoid handing the mantle of leadership of the No side to Sinn Féin if Ganley wasn’t there. Considering that party’s weakened position, the last thing the Irish media establishment wants to do is give it the shot in the arm of portraying it as leading anything. With Ganley on the chessboard, he can be appointed figurehead, sparing the need to pay attention to what the Shinners are doing.

Secondly, Ganley is a businessman, and a successful one. Most other opponents of the Treaty in Ireland are left-wing, they wear beards, many of them are in trade unions and some have stood on the side of the road holding placards. The Irish media worships business and successful businessmen. A successful businessperson can have his or her opinion taken seriously on any topic in Irish society, whether he or she knows anything about it or not and it’s clear Ganley has some understanding of the Treaty, simply by virtue of the fact that he or she has made a success at business. Ganley is credible in a way that people like Patricia McKenna or Mick O’Reilly, people with far vaster experience of anti-EU Treaty campaigns and a much better understanding of the Treaty than Ganley, can never be.