Madam, - In his letter of January 17th, Joe Higgins makes ill-informed and false statements about my business interests. In particular, his comments regarding Albanian privatisation vouchers are completely untrue since these entitlements still belong to the citizens of Albania. It was the collapse of the cash-gathering Albanian pyramid schemes and not the voucher process which caused the failure of the Albanian economy in the 1990s. In fact, I made repeated and strenuous warnings about these disastrous pyramid schemes to the Albanian government and through the international media - including RTÉ - in an attempt to avoid the inevitable disaster. The Kosovo conflict also contributed in no little part to the difficulties in Albania.
All of this, however, is a distraction from the debate on the Lisbon Treaty - which suits the Yes camp just fine since they seek to keep discussion to a minimum in an attempt to herd the Irish people into a far-reaching and undemocratic new constitution for Europe. As the prime advocate and drafter of the Treaty, Giscard D'Estaing, boasted last June, "public opinion will be led to adopt, without knowing it, the proposals we dare not present to them directly".
At least Joe Higgins has the honesty to advocate a No vote in the forthcoming referendum on the Lisbon Treaty; and despite our massive political differences, he and I can at least agree that a No vote is the only logical one for the Irish people.
In a real democracy, people like Joe Higgins and I can debate these issues in public. The people can discern the truth for themselves and vote accordingly. However, the Lisbon Treaty would give us a Europe where key decision-makers, including a powerful president of Europe, would have no democratic accountability to us the citizens. The principles of democracy, accountability and transparency are what matter most and they are in large measure sorely lacking in the EU. Let's stick to the debate on the Treaty and let's stick to the facts. - Yours, etc,
DECLAN GANLEY, Chairman, Libertas, Moyne Park, Tuam, Co Galway.
Madam, - Raymond Deane (January 14th) advances the argument that the philosophical kernel of the so-called "democratic deficit" in the EU resides in the European Commission and in the fundamental principle of its independence from the governments of the member-states in carrying out its functions.
The pragmatic reality is that whatever deficit exists is at the national level where the political and educational systems have failed over 30 years to ensure understanding of the EU institutions to the point that seriously misleading assertions can readily be made with every prospect of being believed.
As is usual in such messages, Mr Deane's letter contains a looming threat - that of Germany unduly influencing the Commission. I have recently come across threats of German economic bullying, German menaces to our neutrality and even to alleged parallels between the EU and the Third Reich! Why is that those who advance what are essentially Irish nationalist themes fall back again and again on arguments which are essentially those of the right-wing, German-hating British media? - Yours, etc,
TONY BROWN, Bettyglen, Raheny, Dublin 5.