7-day fast final day

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August 7th 2011

BREAD N’ WATER 7-DAY FAST – FINAL DAY

Today is the last day of the 7-day bread n’ water fast, a symbolic protest against the penal on-going ECB-dictated bank bondholder bailout.  In a few minutes I’ll be heading for Croke Park to cover the All-Ireland semi-final, and thank God for the diversion, it will make this final day pass easily enough.

As anticipated, as feared, the fast has been in vain, and as with everything else attempted in an effort to highlight the massive injustice being visited on the Irish people on a weekly basis with the relentless payment of these bank bonds, it has registered not even a ripple in the national media.

It’s been a depressing six months of protest, a soul-destroying six months.  Over the next few months, as the budget 2012 proposals are firmed up, we’ll have broadcast to us all the proposed cuts, the closures, the new taxes, reports of the protests being organised against same here, there, everywhere.  What we won’t read about, the bond being paid by Bank of Ireland this Monday, €200,000,000; the bonds being paid this month, €444,260,916; the bonds being paid next month, €4,299,705,436; the bonds being paid next year, €20bn; the bonds being paid to the end of 2015, €60bn. 

The media are meant to be the eyes and ears of the people – where are they?  Reams of coverage of the Cloyne Diocese report, but what of this scandal, this bank robbery with a twist, the ECB robbing – under threat – billions from an already-suffering people?  And robbery is what it is, nothing less.  This is not our debt, was never our debt; neither this government nor the last WANTED to pay it, but were forced to do so by the bullying bungling ECB – ‘A nod is as good as a wink’, in the colourful words of Minister Michael Noonan.

When this day is over, for my own sake and for the sake of my family I have no option but to step back.  It has reduced me physically (10lbs of mostly excess fat), but even more so, it has cost me emotionally.  Depressing, soul-destroying?  I've had the black dog for company for many months now.  Cuts to the fuel/phone/electricity subsidies for the elderly and the poor, Autism programmes closed down, Special Needs Education hammered, hospital beds closed, operations deferred – the poorest, the neediest, the sick, all hit for the sake of millions, while billions are borrowed to pay bank bonds, and we don’t bat an eyelid in protest.  As a civilised and supposedly caring society, how do we justify this?  Watching this, knowing it’s happening, knowing also we’re letting it happen – it’s destroying me.

I'm taking a break from it for a while, so this will be the last annoying mail from me for the foreseeable future.  Wasted my time, and if you even bothered to read any of these missives, wasted yours.  Hopefully someone with a bit more stamina will now take up this fight.

Yours sincerely,

Diarmuid O'Flynn.

The walla-walla bird

THE EU/ECB AND THE EVER-INTENSIFYING EUROPEAN BANKING CRISIS
The walla-walla bird is a bird that spends its life chasing its own tail; it flies around in an ever-decreasing spiral, and flies so fast it flies up its own asshole, from which secluded retreat it shits in the eye of its baffled pursuer.  Remind ye of anyone?

Colm McCarthy's take on the bank bondholder bailout

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August 1st 2011

BREAD N’ WATER 7-DAY FAST – the reason why

The following are extracts taken from an article by Colm McCarthy in the Sunday Independent, July 31^st 2011 – the italics to highlight specific quotes are mine:

“As ministers head for the beaches after the close of the new Government's first parliamentary session, there should be no self-congratulation or talk of corners being turned.

The principal beneficiaries of European policy towards Ireland are those who bought bonds from insolvent Irish banks. Meanwhile, those who bought bonds from an insolvent Greek government are expected to bear at least some of the burden. Whatever relief the package contains for Ireland was grudging, inadequate and arose coincidentally from a belated attempt to solve problems elsewhere in Europe.

One of the reasons why Ireland has been shut out of the sovereign credit markets is the perception that, in addition to the known accumulation of sovereign debt, there may be further exposures for the Exchequer lurking beneath the waves in the murky wreckage of the banking system.

It is entirely fair for our European partners to observe that we have brought this on ourselves but it is equally fair to note that in picking up the tab, the Irish are 'taking one for the team', in the phrase of Sharon Bowles, the British MEP who chairs the Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee. The team, in the form of the EU Commission, the European Central Bank and the Franco-German political leadership, persist in the pretence that the protection of creditors of the bust Irish banks, at the expense of the Irish Exchequer, represents some form of generosity to Irish citizens and taxpayers.

Fortunately, the existing deal with our European partners is impractical as well as unfair. It has not worked, it will not work and there will be further rounds of modifications as Europe gropes towards a resolution of the banking and sovereign debt crises. It will not be enough, in regaining solvency, for the Irish Government to avoid further pay-offs to bondholders in Anglo and Irish Nationwide. The Irish Exchequer's contributions to bank rescue have already destroyed the sovereign's capacity to borrow. There is still an opportunity to avoid default on the sovereign debt of the state, but the ability to avoid this outcome is being undermined by the obligations undertaken to investors in bonds issued by insolvent banks.

The restoration of that ability requires, in addition to vigorous reductions in the budget deficit, that the remaining costs of rescuing the Irish banks be shared with their creditors and with the European institutions whose defence of bank bondholders has helped to create the current untenable situation.

It would be nice if both sovereign and bank bondholder obligation could realistically be met. If they cannot, the choices need to be understood both here and in Europe.”

Colm McCarthy lectures in economics at UCD. He headed an expert group examining State assets and chaired the Special Group on Public Service Numbers and Expenditure Progra-mmes, An Bord Snip Nua. He also authored the report into the semi-state sector from the Review Group on State Assets and Liabilities.

Bread n' Water

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July 31st 2011

BREAD N’ WATER 7-DAY FAST

This is to announce that in an escalation of the Ballyhea Bondholder Bailout Protest, from midnight tonight, Sunday July 31^st, I will be going on a bread-and-water fast, initially for seven days, to be reviewed next Sunday.  The choice of bread and water is symbolic, the penal condition to which the ECB will have us reduced should we continue on the present penal course of redeeming in full all the current failed bank bonds, as directed by them.

I would like to stress, our protest is not against the government, neither this version nor the one preceding; our protest is aimed at Frankfurt and the ECB.  Their hammer, we’re warned, is poised over our heads, ready to apply the fatal blow to our fragile economy if we dare attempt to do to the bank bondholders what should have been done right from the start – give them the haircut that is their due.

Our own leadership is non-existent.  Just eight months ago Fine Gael and Labour deputies, led by Enda Kenny and Eamon Gilmore, were heaping derision on Fianna Fáil and the Greens, castigating the deal done with the troika (IMF/EU/ECB), with not a single government deputy voting against the deal – there was even talk of treason, of traitorous behaviour; now we have the spectacle of Fine Gael and Labour - still led by Kenny and Gilmore - implementing the most heinous aspect of that ‘agreement’, the payment of those failed private bank bonds.  The boot is now very much on the other foot but the same situation pertains – not a single deputy from either government party standing against this sell-out of the Irish people.  Looking after number one, not a conscience, not a principle, between the lot of them.  And they wonder why people are so cynical about our politicians?  No point in protesting to them, when they have already so obviously submitted to the jack-booted will of the ECB. 

This is a solo decision, not even my family consulted; it is also a one-man protest.  Because of the demands of my job it can’t be held I public – Irish Open today, Croke Park next Sunday for the All-Ireland semi-final, prep-work between now and then for the Examiner.  I will, however, try to have as much of it as I can in Ballyhea, if I can arrange for temporary shelter!

If past efforts to throw the spotlight on what’s happening to us are any indication - the hundreds of millions being paid out month after month on these failed bonds even as Hospital services are cut, Special Needs Education reduced, fuel/phone/electricity subsidies for the elderly and the poor diminished – this escalation will register not a whisper, alter matters not a whit.  But I’ve tried everything else I can think of, am now at my wit’s end.

Yours sincerely,

Diarmuid O'Flynn.

Coming-of-age - our 21st Protest March, and we're stepping up

BLOG: http://bondwatchireland.blogspot.com
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TWITTER: @ballyhea14
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July 25th 2011 - coming-of-age, our 21st march and stepping it up

It’s said that one sign of lunacy is to keep doing the same thing over and over again and expect different results. I suppose what we’ve been trying to do in Ballyhea for the last five months and more, and now in Charleville for the last six weeks, could be described as madness, trying not just to mobilise an entire country but to influence almost an entire continent. We do learn, however, and so it is that last Sunday’s march in Ballyhea against the continued obscenity that is the bondholder bailout was simultaneously our coming of age – our 21st weekly march – and our final Sunday morning protest.

So, have we given up, have we lost our mojo? Not a bit of it; in fact far from quitting, we’re stepping up our campaign. No more off-peak protests, no more going out of our way to avoid disruption to anyone; as of this week we will be joining forces with our neighbours in Charleville and alternating our protest marches at 5pm every Friday in the two centres, alternating from week to week, deliberately timed to bring more attention to what’s happening in this country on a weekly basis with NO publicity, namely the regular payment of the failed private bank-to-bank bonds as their ‘maturity’ date comes up.

In fact not alone are we not getting the full news from any of our mainstream media, the news we are getting is either false or fanciful.

That great negotiating ‘victory’ by Enda and the lads last week? Nonsense – that summit happened ONLY because Italy and Spain were being dragged into the crisis, and because Greece was on the brink.
‘Negotiators’? While Sarkozy and Merkel were meeting the previous day to thrash out the details of the deal, including our fate, our Taoiseach didn’t think it worth his while to meet the leadership of any of the other countries on the periphery. Ireland had a real opportunity here, could have stood with Portugal and demanded that whatever deal was offered to Greece should also be offered to us or there would be no deal at all, a situation neither Sarkozy nor Merkel could have contemplated – they didn’t even meet.

And the numbers involved, varying from an annual boost of €800m ‘saved’ (Irish Times and Indo) to €1bn (Irish Examiner)? Again, nonsense – IF we draw down all the monies offered by all the various parties in the original agreement of last November to whom this might apply (€40bn from Europe, €5bn bilateral loans), and IF all those parties agree to extend the new terms (as looks likely now), and IF it’s backdated to take account of money already drawn down (€15bn) then yes, we might ‘save’ that billion.

What’s NOT being reported with the same blaring headlines however is the offsetting effect of the increased baseline ECB lending rate, as applied to the current (and growing) debt to Europe; what’s NOT being reported are the bonds being paid week after week, the massive annual borrowing needed to meet those payments (€7bn this year, €20bn in 2012, €17bn in 2013 – work out the growing interest repayments on those sums), even as cuts and closures are being announced.

A proposed household tax of €100 per family home? Factor in the costs of administering this charge and it will generate about €150m; this Friday, July 29th, and with our money, EBS will pay to an unnamed bank/financial institution a failed unsecured bond of €40m – that’s about the total take from Munster and part of Connacht of the proposed property tax.

Here, among this group in Ballyhea and Charleville, we believe that’s wrong, we believe it must be protested. In Greece, in France, in Spain, when the people are being abused in the way we’re being abused they take to the streets – in Ireland we take to the boat and the plane. Well, not us, not anymore, and even if we’re the only ones in Ireland protesting then so be it, but we’re not going away.

     Brollies up but spirits never dampened – the 21st protest march
Yours sincerely,
Diarmuid O'Flynn.

The Dirty Dozen - w/e July 24th

THE DIRTY DOZEN - WEEK ENDING JULY 24th
The last six bonds paid, the next six in line.
PLEASE NOTE: This is but a small section taken from the full list, which is available elsewhere on this blog.

Current bonds paid & imminent w/e July 17th

The first two columns are the columns most pertinent - date of maturity, bond amount in euro. The other columns contain details of the individual bonds. The bonds shaded in yellow are paid, in red are imminent, in blue are coming down the track, fast.



Please let me know what can be done to make this clearer - thanks.