I know you are all just waiting by your keyboards, ready to pounce at Prime Time's investigation of Declan Ganley due to start in 10 minutes or so. Wait no longer here is your medium.

Keep it clean, keep it honest and if you're lying, keep it in your head.

She says they're not in the studio... but where is she?

Very poor production I thought.

johnfás wrote:

She says they're not in the studio... but where is she?

Who?

Well, what did you make of that johnfas?

The end was like they ran out of money...?

Well that seems to vindicate several posters on this site and on P.ie (mostly banned there).

Several people contradicted his claims re Latvia, the Anglo Adriatic Fund etc. The old man in Albania was particularly strong and supports the view that Anglo Adriatic Investment has never paid out. Ganley's own answer there was shockingly vague but confirmed that no one had received a penny back.
Trying to take it in. It will need a second viewing.

Miriam at the start... she was outside and said "We're not in the studio tonight", most peculiar .

I think Mr Ganley is certainly an interesting character with an unusual and indeed rather suspicious background. It is rare that a successful businessman is quite so private about where his money came from. Seems like a bit of a Del Boy to me - perhaps it is just the poorly chosen suits. Given my study of Politics and in particular the breakdown of the Soviet Union and the Post Communist Transition of Eastern Europe I am naturally suspicious of anyone who was dealing in those sorts of Government bonds.

However, I thought the programme was inconclusive. I guess perhaps it was useful in that it brought forward alot of issues, but it didn't give any answers on them. I did think that the programme had an agenda which it sought to progress, it was certainly not balanced journalism.

What was with the silent credits?

It did prove things, he has claimed for years in business proposals that he was an advisor to the Latvian government , NO HE WAS NOT

He was shady and evasive on all his answers. He said HE pulled out of the Iraq deal , he was contradicted in that , their deal was passed due to irregularities ie it was pulled on him.

Frightened Albanian wrote:

It did prove things, he has claimed for yeears in business proposals that he was an advisor to the Latvian government , NO HE WAS NOT

That only tells me that I shouldn't trust him, but I already didn't. I have, however, been given no further evidence that he the leader of the Illuminati or anything like it.

johnfás wrote:

Frightened Albanian wrote:

It did prove things, he has claimed for yeears in business proposals that he was an advisor to the Latvian government , NO HE WAS NOT

That only tells me that I shouldn't trust him, but I already didn't. I have, however, been given no further evidence that he the leader of the Illuminati or anything like it.

You will have to go the illumanti route solo. I have never suggested any hair brained conspiracy stuff here. johnfas.
Flippancy is not a decent or moral response to that show. how many times did Libertas rubbish the Albania issue on this site?

johnfás wrote:

Frightened Albanian wrote:

It did prove things, he has claimed for yeears in business proposals that he was an advisor to the Latvian government , NO HE WAS NOT

That only tells me that I shouldn't trust him, but I already didn't. I have, however, been given no further evidence that he the leader of the Illuminati or anything like it.

"Leader of the Illuminati"?

From the posts at the other site (I didn't watch it, I'm a Celeb was on), including some yes types, it was a poor hatchet job and a waste of money. What do ye think?

I voted yes. I would most likely vote yes again.

I thought the programme was poor journalism, and that is giving it credit.

toxic avenger wrote:

From the posts at the other site (I didn't watch it, I'm a Celeb was on), including some yes types, it was a poor hatchet job and a waste of money. What do ye think?

Well they caught a few lies out eg Latvia , plus exposed that he had NOT made his fortune from the forestry company Kipelovo as was suggested by CNBSC in their cosy peofile of him. The Albanians did not get any money from Anglo Adriatic Investment Fund an d the comments above. It was rushed, he came across poorly when caught out

Very revealing was also Naoise Nunn stating that Ganley saw Europe vote as a way to "brand" Libertas. Have I not said here before that his interest in the No campaign was free pr.?
Just looking at P.ie it is a cluster of yes men bar two posters, I bet they are missing the banned KevBar and People Korps tonight except in Tuam that is.

toxic avenger wrote:

From the posts at the other site (I didn't watch it, I'm a Celeb was on), including some yes types, it was a poor hatchet job and a waste of money. What do ye think?

Well, to get the issue out of the way, yes, it was a hatchet job. There was nothing about Ganleys politics in it whatsoever or about the Lisbon Referendum. Whether conciously or not, it is part of an establishment push for a second referendum and a Yes vote.

In terms of what it did and did not establish about Ganley, it was very uneven. Given the complexity of his history and its geographic spread, its is not surprising that not every venture was covered in detail. Some notable events, like Cablenet and Hurricane Katrina, were not covered at all (unless when I went to make the tea?). It investigated relatively superficially Ganley's "start" in aluminium and timber (Riga was a rough port, they said) and his self-proclaimed role as a "Government Advisor" to the Latvian Government (nobody in the Latvian Government seemed to be aware of it). Seeing that they went to the trouble of going to Albania and interviewing an old person who had lost his savings in putting privatisation vouchers into Ganley's fund, it was sloppy that they could not say what went wrong with the fund and why the investors seem to have got nothing. It was suggested that the Government stopped the fund from being invested but there was absolutely no comprehensible explanation of what happened. Lazy reporting. The whole business of the former associate who was assassinated was dragged out in spite of the fact that there seems to be no evidence of any connection of this whatsoever with Declan Ganley.
The events in Iraq were reported exactly as they were in the book "Blood Money". This has been written about amply on P.ie so I won't go over it here.

It emerged that SIPO has put Libertas on a weeks "warning" to comply with its requests for documentation on funding/loans and that SIPO consider that Libertas is not cooperating. Declan Ganley suggested that SIPO is in some way an instrument of Dark Forces from Brussels.

I expect the programme will confirm everyone's prior suspicions, whether they are that Ganley misrepresents his past and won't explain things that most business men would want to talk about ad nauseam, or that Ganley is a white knight of democracy being hounded by the Yes people.
It is possible that some people might be disturbed by the gaps between events as reported by Ganley and as rather differently portrayed in the programme.

Indeed, I thought the bits with Naoise Nunn were rather interesting. His wording regarding Mr Ganley deciding that they would oppose the Lisbon Treaty was certainly quite revealing as to how the organisation, at least from the outside, appears to work. I thought it was also a bad reflection on Mr Nunn though, it seemed as if he adbicated personal opinion whilst at Libertas.

Frightened Albanian, on a point of information; Mr Nunn whilst stating that it was useful PR did also say that Ganley was in actuality opposed to the Treaty.

so the general consensus is that the programme was shite

fair enough - I didnt watch it myself - but you can be guaranteed a fair amount of the country did - what they will make of it? who knows?

Im sure most people here didnt learn anything they didn't know before - that has been freely available elsewhere in the Irish media and on line.

As regards the other place - I don't go there anymore - its moronsville for me - guess thats because I've grown bored with it and the posters that I liked to engage with dont hang around there anymore - they probably went off and got lives and have more important things to be doing with their time - kind of the same direction Im going in , in all honesty.

Frightened Albanian wrote:

toxic avenger wrote:

From the posts at the other site (I didn't watch it, I'm a Celeb was on), including some yes types, it was a poor hatchet job and a waste of money. What do ye think?

Well they caught a few lies out eg Latvia , plus exposed that he had NOT made his fortune from the forestry company Kipelovo as was suggested by CNBSC in their cosy peofile of him. The Albanians did not get any money from Anglo Adriatic Investment Fund an d the comments above. It was rushed, he came across poorly when caught out

Very revealing was also Naoise Nunn stating that Ganley saw Europe vote as a way to "brand" Libertas. Have I not said here before that his interest in the No campaign was free pr.? He lied when asked about the dead Albanian. etc
Just looking at P.ie it is a cluster of yes men bar two posters, I bet they are missing the banned KevBar and People Korps tonight except in Tuam that is.

My impression is that they showed his money-making in the early-to-mid 90s was murky and questionable morally, but that they didn't provide any hard evidence that he did anything illegal or wrong. As someone who would be slightly suspicious of the Ganley agenda, that would mean that nothing new has been learned. As to the campaign being 'free PR', you can't have it both ways. Either Ganley was funding the whole show or he wasn't. And if he was, it's very expensive PR indeed, he could have taken out full page ads in the national newspapers for a year at less cost...

toxic avenger wrote:

Frightened Albanian wrote:

toxic avenger wrote:

From the posts at the other site (I didn't watch it, I'm a Celeb was on), including some yes types, it was a poor hatchet job and a waste of money. What do ye think?

Well they caught a few lies out eg Latvia , plus exposed that he had NOT made his fortune from the forestry company Kipelovo as was suggested by CNBSC in their cosy peofile of him. The Albanians did not get any money from Anglo Adriatic Investment Fund an d the comments above. It was rushed, he came across poorly when caught out

Very revealing was also Naoise Nunn stating that Ganley saw Europe vote as a way to "brand" Libertas. Have I not said here before that his interest in the No campaign was free pr.? He lied when asked about the dead Albanian. etc
Just looking at P.ie it is a cluster of yes men bar two posters, I bet they are missing the banned KevBar and People Korps tonight except in Tuam that is.

My impression is that they showed his money-making in the early-to-mid 90s was murky and questionable morally, but that they didn't provide any hard evidence that he did anything illegal or wrong. As someone who would be slightly suspicious of the Ganley agenda, that would mean that nothing new has been learned. As to the campaign being 'free PR', you can't have it both ways. Either Ganley was funding the whole show or he wasn't. And if he was, it's very expensive PR indeed, he could have taken out full page ads in the national newspapers for a year at less cost...

They established that he misrepresented and concealed his past to an unusual extent - plenty of business people would exaggerate their financial worth or success, but this is was presented as being very odd. There were several possibilities suggested about the funding - that Ganley was a large donor ( I don't think anyone suggests that he funded "the whole show"), a large lender, or that Ganley acted as a conduit for money from other sources. There was an apparent leak from SIPO that he was considered to be non-cooperative.

Strangely, no reference was made to Liam Lawlor at all - there were some very odd omissions. Were there legal pressures on the programme?

The publicity that Ganley got in the Referendum Campaign was much more substantial (wall to wall tv, radio and press) than newspaper ads could give.

.

Quote :

"Cactus Flower:The whole business of the former associate who was assassinated was
dragged out in spite of the fact that there seems to be no evidence of
any connection of this whatsoever with Declan Ganley

Yes but he denied knowing the man and they showed that he did!!!
The contention that he is not only less the forthcoming about his past but that his Cv is laced with inaccurate claims was shown re South American TV and Latvia. The Anglo Adriatic Investment Fund was his company, RTE were weak chasing the money but It has opened the door I am sure if someone sere to spend more time there it would make a good book.

A good start in the main stream media.
I thought Nunn was good to appear...........I think he has a lot more to say and possibly the desire to say it. The words "Brand Libertas" remember that!!!

Quote :

Toxic avenger :As to the campaign being 'free PR', you can't have it both ways. Either
Ganley was funding the whole show or he wasn't. And if he was, it's
very expensive PR indeed, he could have taken out full page ads in the
national newspapers for a year at less cost...

Come on Ganley got Pan European , indeed global publicity from doing his No campaign here, also you assume that we know what exactly he was launching . No one not even his minions know what he is launching. Cheap at half the price as a PR game. The EU money he applied for today if given will compensate and can be spent on further public profile building such as conferences and "education"

And I agree Cactus Flower No Liam Lawlor not even a mention despite his own evidence at Mahon.

cactus flower wrote:

They established that he misrepresented and concealed his past to an unusual extent - plenty of business people would exaggerate their financial worth or success, but this is was presented as being very odd. There were several possibilities suggested about the funding - that Ganley was a large donor ( I don't think anyone suggests that he funded "the whole show"), a large lender, or that Ganley acted as a conduit for money from other sources. There was an apparent leak from SIPO that he was considered to be non-cooperative.

Strangely, no reference was made to Liam Lawlor at all - there were some very odd omissions. Were there legal pressures on the programme?

The publicity that Ganley got in the Referendum Campaign was much more substantial (wall to wall tv, radio and press) than newspaper ads could give.

I'd agree that there is a level of concealment at work here, for what reason I don't know. I would be opposed to what I perceive as a very right-wing agenda, especially with regard to labour practices, union recognition etc. With regard to Lawlor, I'd like to know more about exactly what he did for his 30K out in Albania. The bit I do know is that Ganley convincingly gave evidence at the Mahon Tribunal to prove that Lawlor stole a letterhead from him to create a false invoice to cover another crooked payment from Dunlop - Ganley was clearly unaware of what Lawlor was up to. I would say that there is a sustained campaign against Ganley at work purely motivated by annoyance at his role in helping secure a no vote, whatever substance there might be in some of the charges against him. I didn't see the program, but from what I've read about it, little was offered to decisively sway my opinion on him one way or the other, so I'm still as in the dark as I ever was.

I agree with all of your last post, toxic avenger, but I would add that his role in the No vote imo is greatly exaggerated. He undoubtedly alienated people as well as encouraging people to vote no. He was happy to use the media for promotion of his campaign, but reaches for the legal threats faster than any politician I have every come across. Frankly I don't think he can last politically if the amount of scrutiny grows in proportion to the ambitions of Libertas.

Myles_per_hour put across Ganley's weaker moments pretty accurately on P.ie:

Originally Posted by Myles_per_hour

"A pretty damning programme.

Ganley claims to have been an adviser to the Latvian government. Oh no he wasn't, says the Latvian prime minister.

Ganley then claims to have been an advisor to a junior minister in Latvia. Actually you were one of a large group of people, unpaid, who in effect hung around the minister suggesting things. And the minister himself was only in office a short time.

In other words, Dekko was not an adviser to the Latvian government. Oh dear.

Dekko's company claimed to have a lot of television stations in Central America. Funny then that the company's 'business partner' said the stations never got off the ground. Oh dear.

Dekko claims that his business venture did not cost a lot of poor Albanian people their money. Funny then that a pensioner says that it did and that company has become notorious in Albania. Oh dear.

Dekko claims not to know a man killed in Albania who it was alleged was linked to his company. There was no suggestion whatsoever that Dekko had anything whatsoever to do with the man's death. But Dekko denies even knowing him. But journalists in the country say they knew each other. The murdered man's widow said they knew each other. Oh dear.
(Even worse, in defending himself Dekko then made claims about the murdered man and questioned his standards - the man actually was a whistleblower. Why attack the man, Dekko? Why attack his reputation? When under pressure Dekko as he did repeatedly tried to blame the EU for 'smearing' him. Please explain, Dekko, whether you think the EU bribed journalists in Albania, and even the man's widow, to say he knew you. )

Dekko has claimed repeatedly to have had nothing whatsoever to do with Iraq. (I've had run-ins with his people for daring to even mention Iraq and Ganley in the same sentence.) Yet it turns out Dekko has had links with Iraq. The deals he tried to arrange fell through. But that is a hell of a lot different to the 'Declan has had nothing to do with Iraq' mantra his people have spun out every time anyone even mentioned any connection. And how come the Pentagon said your deal was pulled when the contract your company submitted contained a clause that would have de-facto created a fourth mobile network in Iraq when it was never meant to have been there, and allegedly withdrew the deal on that basis. Yet you to camera give an entirely different explanation, one you cannot source, unlike the programme that explicitly named the person who says they pulled the deal because of the mobile clause.

Almost every single thing Ganley said to camera was contradicted, explicitly and unambiguously, by among others a prime minister, a former minister, Albanian journalists, a dead man's widow, someone in the CIA, an Irish Times journalist, one of the victims of the business venture in Albania, etc.

As to the sudden end of the programme, I think people can guess the reason. But as Mr Ganley loves throwing around legal threats I will not say it.

I cannot remember the last time I saw a television programme where someone's claims about themselves were so openly, explicitly and unambiguously contradicted by so many other people.

As for SIPO, the rules for private campaigns are far more lax than apply to parties and candidates. Yet curiously Libertas is unwilling to meet those minimal standards of disclosure. Some news then Dekko - if you don't a file will go to the DPP for possible prosecution. But of course no doubt in Dekko-land the DPP, like RTE, the Albanian pensioners, the Latvian PM, an ex-minister, a woman in the CIA, a widow, Albanian journalists, SIPO are all part of an EU conspiracy against St Declan!

Yeah right."

Quote :

The bit I do know is that Ganley convincingly gave evidence at the
Mahon Tribunal to prove that Lawlor stole a letterhead from him to
create a false invoice to cover another crooked payment from Dunlop -
Ganley was clearly unaware of what Lawlor was up to.

Lawlor was dead when Ganley gave evidence. Are you Mahon? How do you assert "Ganley convincingly" anything, the report is not in. He was caught out on several points of fact o n eth show , ie he said one thing and the people who could confirm it contradicted him.

Myles is the lone voice over there at the mo.

cactus flower wrote:

I agree with all of your last post, toxic avenger, but I would add that his role in the No vote imo is greatly exaggerated. He undoubtedly alienated people as well as encouraging people to vote no. He was happy to use the media for promotion of his campaign, but reaches for the legal threats faster than any politician I have every come across. Frankly I don't think he can last politically if the amount of scrutiny grows in proportion to the ambitions of Libertas.

Myles_per_hour put across Ganley's weaker moments pretty accurately on P.ie:

Originally Posted by Myles_per_hour

"A pretty damning programme.

Ganley claims to have been an adviser to the Latvian government. Oh no he wasn't, says the Latvian prime minister.

Ganley then claims to have been an advisor to a junior minister in Latvia. Actually you were one of a large group of people, unpaid, who in effect hung around the minister suggesting things. And the minister himself was only in office a short time.

In other words, Dekko was not an adviser to the Latvian government. Oh dear.

Dekko's company claimed to have a lot of television stations in Central America. Funny then that the company's 'business partner' said the stations never got off the ground. Oh dear.

Dekko claims that his business venture did not cost a lot of poor Albanian people their money. Funny then that a pensioner says that it did and that company has become notorious in Albania. Oh dear.

Dekko claims not to know a man killed in Albania who it was alleged was linked to his company. There was no suggestion whatsoever that Dekko had anything whatsoever to do with the man's death. But Dekko denies even knowing him. But journalists in the country say they knew each other. The murdered man's widow said they knew each other. Oh dear.
(Even worse, in defending himself Dekko then made claims about the murdered man and questioned his standards - the man actually was a whistleblower. Why attack the man, Dekko? Why attack his reputation? When under pressure Dekko as he did repeatedly tried to blame the EU for 'smearing' him. Please explain, Dekko, whether you think the EU bribed journalists in Albania, and even the man's widow, to say he knew you. )

Dekko has claimed repeatedly to have had nothing whatsoever to do with Iraq. (I've had run-ins with his people for daring to even mention Iraq and Ganley in the same sentence.) Yet it turns out Dekko has had links with Iraq. The deals he tried to arrange fell through. But that is a hell of a lot different to the 'Declan has had nothing to do with Iraq' mantra his people have spun out every time anyone even mentioned any connection. And how come the Pentagon said your deal was pulled when the contract your company submitted contained a clause that would have de-facto created a fourth mobile network in Iraq when it was never meant to have been there, and allegedly withdrew the deal on that basis. Yet you to camera give an entirely different explanation, one you cannot source, unlike the programme that explicitly named the person who says they pulled the deal because of the mobile clause.

Almost every single thing Ganley said to camera was contradicted, explicitly and unambiguously, by among others a prime minister, a former minister, Albanian journalists, a dead man's widow, someone in the CIA, an Irish Times journalist, one of the victims of the business venture in Albania, etc.

As to the sudden end of the programme, I think people can guess the reason. But as Mr Ganley loves throwing around legal threats I will not say it.

I cannot remember the last time I saw a television programme where someone's claims about themselves were so openly, explicitly and unambiguously contradicted by so many other people.

As for SIPO, the rules for private campaigns are far more lax than apply to parties and candidates. Yet curiously Libertas is unwilling to meet those minimal standards of disclosure. Some news then Dekko - if you don't a file will go to the DPP for possible prosecution. But of course no doubt in Dekko-land the DPP, like RTE, the Albanian pensioners, the Latvian PM, an ex-minister, a woman in the CIA, a widow, Albanian journalists, SIPO are all part of an EU conspiracy against St Declan!

Yeah right."

I certainly don't believe he delivered the no vote, certainly he didn't deliver mine (which is pretty much assured for every Euro-vote), but I do believe Libertas brought a coherence and money to the no side that would have been lacking, perhaps decisively so, in its absence. As to NotDevSon/Myles_Per_Hour, I'd take his posts a little more seriously if he wasn't so annoyingly shrill all the time (the story of the fifty foot no-campaigning giants attacking him on Grafton Street or wherever, which turned out to be entirely provoked by himself and nothing like as sinister, being an infamous and hilarious example)...