Ronan keeps pushing the boundaries, whether we like it or not
:: Developer back in the spotlight, as if Celtic Tiger neverwentaway
IN A testimonial to property developer Johnny Ronan, China’s former ambassador to Ireland described him as someone with a “vision to always push boundaries”.
This week a video of the business tycoon joking in a Cape Town bar in February about the coronavirus, which originated in China and has claimed more than 4,600 lives there, went viral, prompting an apology from Ronan after it sent social media into a frenzy.
Ronan, who infamously sent out a press release announcing the end of his “romantic relationship” with former ‘Xposé’ presenter Glenda Gilson, is sometimes accused of pushing boundaries too far.
He once signed off a written statement to the Oireachtas banking inquiry with the Nazi slogan “Arbeit Macht Frei” (work will set you free), which hung above the entrance to the Auschwitz concentration camp.
He later apologised and insisted being in Nama was not comparable to the “horrors perpetrated by the Nazi regime”.
The Carrick-on-Suir man kept somewhat of a low profile in recent years as he worked to rebuild his property empire after the financial crash.
From High Court planning disputes with Dublin City Council to a TD calling him “obnoxious”, he’s back grabbing controversial headlines in 2020 like he did during the Celtic Tiger years.
Generating outrage on ‘Liveline’ and in the Dáil on the same day is no mean feat.
Ronan, who founded the now wound-up Treasury Holdings, which developed some of the most iconic buildings in Dublin including the Convention Centre and the Google headquarters, perhaps fits the definition of Marmite.
Friends and like-minded business people love him, a certain proportion of the public seems to loathe him.
Born in Tipperary to a pig farmer-turned-property developer, he was educated in Castleknock College where he met his former Treasury Holdings partner, Richard Barrett.
On Thursday night in the Dáil, a different Richard Barrett hit out at the multimillionaire, taking issue with Ronan expanding his property portfolio.
“He has his name plastered over development sites all over the city making an absolute fortune while people are suffering from homelessness,” People Before Profit TD Richard Boyd-Barrett said.
Ronan would contest that he is actually helping alleviate the housing crisis.
In an interview with the Irish Independent on February 20, he slammed as “scandalous” the decision to overturn planning permission granted to increase the height of two apartment blocks in Dublin’s docklands.
The apartments are being built by Spencer Place Development Company, which is owned by Ronan Group Real Estate.
He blasted how the legal action was delaying 548 “badly needed” residential units – including 47 social housing units.
“Dublin City Council’s position is indefensible. Wouldn’t they be better trying to solve the housing crisis instead of building white water rafting parks,” he said.
Ronan appears to have fallen out of favour with the council, which also recently rejected his third bid to increase the height of Salesforce’s new European headquarters at Spencer Dock.
“But sure the taxpayer bailed you out” is a common slur directed at the colourful developer, but in 2014 he became the first major borrower to exit Nama having paid off the full value of his €400m loans.
He then began to make his comeback in 2015 after securing a €300m war chest to build and develop prime real estates sites in Dublin and London.
Repaying his debts didn’t win over the jury of social
media though, as the flaunting of his lavish lifestyle always appears to come back to haunt him.
Who could forget the time he whisked former Miss World Rosanna Davison off on a private jet for one night in Marrakesh?
A business meeting in the former Ritz-Carlton hotel in Powerscourt ended with Rosanna and her friend Sarah being flown to Morocco by Ronan.
In an interview with the ‘Sunday Independent’ afterwards, she spoke about the negative publicity the trip generated. “I was quite shocked by the level of interest in this story,” she said.
“My family was involved, my relationship was brought into it, my parents. It’s one thing me dealing with it, but when my family are involved, well, then it gets harder.
“I don’t regret any aspect of the trip. I don’t regret the spontaneity of it. I found it liberating. I found it exciting,” she said. “It was complete innocent fun.”
Ronan’s devil-may-care attitude to life is perhaps what makes him a successful businessman, and perhaps what rubs some people up the wrong way.
His WhatsApp profile has a picture of the Robert Downey Jr quote: “Listen, smile, agree, and then do whatever the f**k you were gonna do anyway.”
A bit like the time he wanted to make one of Dublin’s best known sculptures undergo a “sex change” because he objected to a “naked man climbing up the wall” outside his office.
“I was very open to changing it to a woman,” the commissioned artist Rowan Gillespie said.
The backlash he received this week over the coronavirus video was compounded when news broke that iconic café Bewley’s was to close, with the loss of 110 jobs.
Bewley’s had been paying €1.5m annual rent to RGRE Grafton Limited, a company controlled by Ronan, and stated its request for a rent holiday in late March had been denied.
In 2012, Bewley’s took legal action seeking to have its rent halved to €728,000, as recommended by an independent arbitrator.
However, this was later overturned by the Supreme Court, which ruled in the Ronan Group’s favour.
A source close to Mr Ronan accused Bewley’s of seeking to “put blame on the landlord”, calling on Bewley’s owners, the Campbell family, to sustain the company “with its own substantial resources”.
“Landlords, like their tenants, come in all shapes and sizes, as do their financial structures and balance sheets,” the source said.
In a tweet on Thursday, Green Party MEP for Dublin Ciarán Cuffe claimed that he had called Ronan 16 years ago when Bewley’s was then under threat to ask if he could help.
“‘Business is business’ was his reply,” Cuffe said.
“No change there it seems.” Business partners describe Ronan as “firm, but fair” and “pragmatic in his approach”. He is someone who demonstrates “roughness, together with grace”.
Former Olympic cyclist Philip Cassidy, who featured alongside Ronan in the coronavirus videos, told RTÉ’s ‘Liveline’ on Thursday Ronan was “devastated” by the fallout.
He said the video was recorded at a time when nobody knew the horrific impact the virus would go on to have.
Ronan subsequently apologised unreservedly in a statement.
In another video recorded on the Cape Town trip, Cassidy can be heard saying “we should bring a couple of crates of corona back to Nama… not the liquid stuff now”.
He confirmed it was a joke at the time which “obviously isn’t funny now”.
One thing’s for sure, since Ronan made his comeback, the public’s fascination with people associated with wealth and excess as seen in the Celtic Tiger days has also well and truly returned.
‘Listen, smile, agree, and then do what ever the f **k you were going to do anyway’