BACKGROUND:WHEN LUKE Flanagan first entered the political fray his nom de guerre was "Ming the Merciless", his shaved head and pointed beard a homage to the baddie in the Flash Gordon fantasy series.
Since then the nickname has been whittled down to Ming, but it’s clear the “Merciless” part of it wasn’t based on looks alone.
The Independent TD for Roscommon-South Leitrim has become embroiled in a number of high-octane and personalised spats with fellow TDs since being elected to the Dáil in February 2011. His exchanges with colleagues and the personal nature of his political style have made him a highly divisive figure among his colleagues.
That came to a head when he was involved in a nasty verbal altercation with Ceann Comhairle Seán Barrett in the Dáil corridor last month. That controversy has rumbled on into the summer recess and Flanagan has made further allegations about Barrett across various media – his Twitter and Facebook accounts, as well as an op-ed article in the Irish Daily Mail this week.
He has alleged that Barrett is incompetent, biased and unfit for office and has also made a highly personal comment about Barrett “guzzling pints” in the Dáil bar. That latter criticism has drawn the ire of the Fine Gael TD Mary Mitchell O’Connor, who described his comments as disgusting and disgraceful.
But the outburst is not atypical. When Flanagan becomes involved in rows with political opponents he is unrelenting, ruthless, shrill and occasionally nasty.
A passionate and able spokesman, he has been a leading figure in high-profile local campaigns including Roscommon Hospital Action Committee, the turf-cutters’ campaign and farmers’ protests about excessive flooding in the Shannon basin.
But in so doing he has occasionally brought hyperbole to new – and sometimes banal – heights. It culminated in the Dáil when he compared the plight of turf-cutters being deprived of turbary rights to the Holocaust in Nazi Germany. It so happened that the Minister leading the debate on the Government side was Alan Shatter, who is the only Jewish member of the Oireachtas. When Flanagan refused to withdraw the comment, Shatter called him an “ignorant buffoon”.
Indeed, the first controversy involved Mitchell O’Connor.
Flanagan and Shane Ross were sitting beside Mick Wallace in the chamber when the latter dubbed her “Miss Piggy”. While the other two apologised, Flanagan refused to do so on the basis that he had said nothing (which was true).
In his article this week, he described Barrett as a bad referee in his role as Ceann Comhairle. To extend the metaphor, Flanagan has had a habit of playing the man rather than the ball in rows with Dáil colleagues.
The Fine Gael TD for Roscommon-South Leitrim Frank Feighan was the focus of some very negative comments over Roscommon County Hospital, while other Fine Gael TDs Marcella Corcoran- Kennedy (from Laois-Offaly) and Paul Connaughton (from Galway East) have got blasted by Flanagan on Twitter for public positions they adopted on Shannon flooding and the turf-cutters’ dispute.
The Dáil press gallery has been another target in the past few months, with Flanagan complaining that reporters in the gallery don’t adequately report on Oireachtas proceedings. He has suggested they be selected by lottery, and has also made an issue of the fact that the chair of the gallery is the Irish Independent’s political editor, or “Denis O’Brien’s chief scribe”, as he calls him.
Several TDs who witnessed the row between Flanagan and Barrett in the Dáil corridor said Flanagan’s attack was ferocious and completely over the top.
“He lost the plot. He was flailing his arms and shouting and roaring,” said one TD with no party axe to grind.
On his local radio station the following day, Flanagan justified the outburst: “The reality is I was born this way. I do not have a choice but to be the person I am. If I was born black or if I was born with one leg or whatever, would he have a right to have a go at me? No, he wouldn’t.”
The modus operandi he has established since becoming a TD is never to back down or apologise; to assert that he is always right and that others are, therefore, always wrong.
