Councillors unhappy with aspects of Canadian PM's visit to West Mayo
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney meets well-wishers during his visit to Westport Town Hall Theatre on Sunday, June 14. Picture: Andrew Downes/PA Wire
The outgoing Cathaoirleach of Westport-Belmullet Municipal District has said the recent civic reception for Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney should have been held in his ancestral village of Aughagower instead of Westport.
Speaking at last week's meeting of the municipal district, Cllr Peter Flynn claimed locals in Aughagower were sidelined for the historic visit on June 14 despite making huge efforts to ensure the community centre looked its best.
"Only for Mark Carney mingled with the crowd after Mass, he would have been whisked out of there and the community would never have had a chance to meet him. I don’t want to take away from the day, but our local TD Keira Keogh was not invited to Aughagower and neither were our local councillors, including our Leas Cathaoirleach, Cllr John O’Malley, who was deputising in my absence on the day. This is not acceptable. If we don’t recognise our councillors and our TDs, we are not recognising the people they represent.”
Cllr Flynn also asked why local musical artists were not in the line-up at the civic reception in Westport Town Hall.
“Where were our local musicians, the town band, our Comhaltas and Cresham School of Dancing members? We have world champion dancers who didn’t get a chance to put on a display. Also, so many people from Aughgower didn’t get an invitation to that civic reception and unfortunately, it has left a bad taste in people’s mouths, and it would be remiss of me not to mention it. So, while overall the event was a huge success, we need to figure out how to fix these things so that we don’t repeat the same mistakes in the future.”
Cllr O’Malley said many locals in Aughagower were "excluded" from the community centre when the Canadian Prime Minister was there “yet people from outside Ballinrobe were going to the Mass”, adding: “It was all very badly organised. A lot of time was spent putting up pictures [in the community centre] of Mr Carney’s family story from his grandfather’s time, yet he never got to see them. If he did not take his own initiative to walk around the village, people would not have seen him at all.”
Cllr O'Malley claimed the municipal district "was cut out completely" from the planning of the event.
- Published as part of the Local Democracy Reporting Scheme.
