The Sleeping Warrior Blog

I had a dream..a sort of nightmare. I had an irresistible urge to beg, buy, borrow or steal every Westlife album ever made.  I then put them up on bittorrent  for everyone worldwide to fileshare on P2P to try to deny any more income to Westlife’s Shane Filan’s development company. Then I woke up..drifting back to the reality of what’s going on in our village. It might sound like a Michael Moore film but this one is just as scary as his.

I’ll start by saying that the comment below is my opinion and the opinion of others…in case they come after me we have to point that out..it’s only opinions and we are still legally entitled to those..just about. This is not a personal attack on Shane who is a really nice talented guy who works hard at what he does. It concerns Shafin Developments, the company he owns with his family. It’s all about the planning system and how it works..and who it works for.

It’s a long story but his some of his proceeds from the Westlife Empire have gone into destroying our local village, which also happens to be the historical seat of the O’Rourkes, of which as you can see and I’m one that carries a particular rare Gene going back over a thousand years (DNA tested..yep..scary). Dromahair was a major property and homeplace for the main branch of the O’Rourkes for more than 800 years. For the last 170 years or so Dromahair, being built by the Landlords the Lanes-Foxes, has also been known as the prettiest village in Ireland, sitting in the picturesque valley of the River Bonet.

I won’t get into the history of, and the details of, the planning permission process here, but in the first wave Shafin Developments have somehow managed to concrete over what was probably the medieval Dromahair of the O’Rourkes with nasty naff cheaply built 21st Century cabins. Not sensitively built in areas behind the village..nope..it’s in in your face as you enter the town, downgrading the first impression to that of a classic example of tasteless Celtic Tiger grab for profit. Nasty boxes made from ticky-tacky. This is not a rich pop star’s money doing something useful for the community…far from it. There’s many things they could do for the community if they volunteered the funding. Ironically I know he enjoys spending time in the community as a way of escaping the madding crowd surrounding the pop business.

The latest big shock is that now he has been granted planning permission to redevelop the site of The Breffni Centre, aka Patton’s pub and hall. We are going to get a Crèche, gym and supermarket. OK..the first two it might be argued are needed by some people, although a new crèche has already recently opened. The big problem is the supermarket. In the village we have three shops. Two are small supermarkets and both are run by local families who have been there for years..McGoldricks and Gilmors. I think that Gilmor’s has even been there since the village was built. Both stores have recently spent a fortune upgrading their premises goods and services..with Gilmors reputedly spending maybe over half a million euro on refurbishment. The village now has modern shops with great products and services. So..why the hell have they granted planning permission for Shafin to wipe out these two main stores as well as the corner shop which also has been recently re-developed?. That’s the million-euro question.

One other point has just reared it’s head, is about Gilmor’s shop.  It’s not only a supermarket, but also a hardware/animal feed/general store which provides the local lifeline to farmers in the immediate area. If Gilmor’s supermarket is taken down by Shafin’s new shop then I doubt if the other business of the general store/farming supplies can stand on its own and will go down as well. Whilst there may be a few people indifferent to the planning decision, it may hit home hard when the next time they need a bag of Beef nuts, or a sledge hammer, or €5 worth of oval nails, a pair of overalls and a wheelbarrow in a hurry they will have to drive the 25 mile round trip to Sligo or Manorhamilton. I can assure you that it will hit a good few people hard having that essential service withdrawn from village life.

I for one would like to see a copy of the economic argument put forward for this new shop…if it even exists. Somehow I doubt if it mentions that the two/three existing shops that have just invested very heavily will be forced out of business by this development. I’d be be obliged if anyone can send me a copy of that document. To make sense an argument for this new shop it has to be either highly misinformed at best or potentially fraudulent at worst.

We don’t know what the building is going to look like yet, but knowing what they’ve built in the past and the total disregard for tasteful sensitive architecture in Co.Leitrim generally, it will be a modernist monstrosity sitting in the middle of a classic period village…one of a kind. Development in architecturally sensitive towns and villages is supposed to enhance the local social and physical fabric…not destroy it. Why is it seen by most people that rich pop stars can get the planning authorities to do what they want, when local development for the community can’t get approval? For many people it all smells of something that Ireland is all too used to from the past.

The reality of this planning decision is that the traditional shops and their families are certainly going to be bankrupt because of a millionaire pop star’s family involvement in development. The only beneficiary of this misery is..Shafin Deveopments.

Of course, there are the other factors in the equation. When all development in Ireland has ground to a halt why does Shafin want to keep building where it’s not wanted or needed. It’s the opinion of most here that it’s something to do with tax affairs, and the only reason that would appear to make sense to a lot of people anyway.

There are many questions to be asked about the development by Shafin Developments in Dromahair, but it seems that no-one is prepared to ask them. I really don’t think that Shane is the right person to talk to about it. In fairness I remember him as a young kid and he is a nice guy actually and I’m sure this is all driven by his advisers and family. Shane lives in the world of constant touring, hotels, fan madness, record promotion and all the strangeness of the life of a popular performer. He knows that he’s a commodity on the shelf of the record companies shop and has a best before date. Then you need another job…

I’ll finish by saying that many people in the village are raging and very depressed over the latest planning decision on the Supermarket. We can’t trust planners and their decisions or developers. The Lanes-Foxes built the Dromahair you see not for themselves, but for their grandchildren and beyond and their communities…not for instant profit. That’s what determines what is right..and what should and should not be built. If the blame for Ireland’s woes has to go somewhere, it has to be with the planners. They are the ones who stood over building 350,000 unwanted houses in the country and the vampire banks just had a field day supplying the finance to the developers. Now we know the banks had to get it from somewhere.. which left the country broke. All pigs at the trough.

If it comes to either direct action or using international media being the only ways left..then maybe we’ll use them and see if I can rustle up a few more O’Rourkes to help us out. Traditionally our Clan were never shy of a fight..having caused the Norman Invasion of Ireland. That was over a woman though..according to legend. I’m sure that the great Chiefs of Dromahair would approve of this fight, seeing as some of the physical remnants of their existence were concreted over. The descendants of the old O’Rourkes come from all over the world to this place seeing it as a genetic pilgrimage and complain endlessly to me about it being ruined by modern tasteless short-sighted development. Heritage tourists used to provide an income stream into the village, now they’re being scared away.

OK..off back to sleep to find those Westlife albums..or Michael Moore to give us a hand with this one. The camera might be mightier than the sword, but many years using both I like to think I’m OK…just in case.