Niamh Walsh’s Manifesto
Blind to the plight of a distressed princess
FROM when I was a tot I was instilled with the belief that my life was limitless. My parents inculcated in me a sense that I could achieve anything and this was reinforced by some wonderful teachers.
I never had a sense that being born a girl would be restrictive. I accept that is not every young girl’s experience, I can only but attest to my own. However, I have very vivid memories about Mary
Robinson’s election as Ireland’s first woman president.
While too young to fully grasp the momentousness of her ascent, it was an early induction into politics. A dawning that there were forces whose decisions could determine my destiny; that other people had the power to help or hinder my hopes for the future.
So Mrs Robinson’s election cemented in me that little girls could grow to be power-wielding women. In the years since I haven’t thought too much about her until lately when she popped up in Dubai having lunch with the kingdom’s missing Princess Latifa Al Maktoum whom she dismissed as a ‘troubled young woman’.
That Mary Robinson – who broke the barriers on so many levels as president decades ago – could callously dismiss this young woman is unforgivable.
She has claimed she was ‘misled’. But a picture speaks a million words and one doesn’t need a doctorate to see that Princess Latifa’s troubles were not of her own making. She is a walking, non-talking catatonic human rights violation, and Mrs Robinson – who has travelled the world advocating for human rights in her role as UN high commissioner for human rights – was utterly blind to her pitiful plight.
In what is a damning indictment of a lack of empathy, this week Princess Latifa resurfaced and she recounted her December 2018 meeting with Mary Robinson saying they talked sport and Mary talked about her book. Mrs Robinson’s mission to Dubai was purportedly to check on Latifa, a task she failed most miserably.
That she didn’t carry out cursory checks is unconscionable. Did she request a private meeting, ask to see medical records, or speak to medics or minders? That she didn’t even enquire into the whereabouts of Latifa’s disappeared sister Princess Shamsa – who has not been seen or heard from since she was snatched from the streets of London, aged 19, some years ago – I find unforgivable.
So, as books seem of a concern to Mary Robinson, let us hope that this is not the last chapter in the life of Princess Latifa and she merits more than a footnote in another Robinson tome.
Stop propping up shameful regime
ON the subject of ‘missing Princess Latifa’ it is safe to assume that no nation state is going to ride to her rescue. Her father is the biggest landowner in the UK. He holds an Irish passport and as the Middle East’s moneybags this is one family dispute that even the US won’t stick its meddling neck into.
So Latifa’s fate really is in the hands of the women of the world. This is a real instance when girls really do have that power some like to wax lyrical about.
So all the ‘huns’ who have been schlepping to Dubai with their ‘Be kind’ bikinis may want to think of putting their money where their memes are and halt propping up a regime that treats even its own daughter so shamefully.
If people stop putting money in the pockets of the Dubai royal family maybe then the ruler will focus his mind on fixing the problem of his ‘troubled daughter’ and grant her the freedom that most of us take for granted.
Hypocrite Harry can’t do privacy
THAT Prince Harry is hapless is a mild amusement to most. That he is a blatant hypocrite should be of concern given, despite calling for privacy, Harry and Meghan have no intention of going quietly to live a life of obscurity.
This week all ties with the British royal family and Harry and Meghan were officially severed. And it seems that with no royal restraints the silk gloves are off with a ‘tell-all’ interview with Oprah Winfrey in the offing.
Harry and Meghan are quite entitled to share their tales of woe with the world. But given the couple seem destined for a life of greater public influence, they should at least have the courage of their convictions. And this pair are convincing nobody that a life as commoners was ever their one true wish.
Don’t be like high f lyin’ Ted
IF YOU think our politicians are a bunch of clowns we can take heart that the US republican senator Ted Cruz is in a chutzpah class of his own. The Texas senator this week got a roasting – not from the Cancun sun he was headed, but from the world-at-large when he was pictured on a plane to Mexico at a time that his home state is suffering its worst emergency.
Cruz claimed that he was taking his teenage daughters to safe harbour in Mexico, an odd choice of safety given he previously supported Donald Trump’s claims that Mexicans are by and large a bunch of ‘murdering rapists’.
But his Cancun jolly jig was up when texts surfaced from his wife’s neighbourhood WhatsApp group revealing the family were getting out of disaster dodge.
So a word to the wise: If you are planning a getaway during a global pandemic, don’t broadcast your capers to the neighbours.
We all know who the real top dog is!
BORIS JOHNSON’S rescue terrier Dilyn has sparked a diplomatic incident at Downing Street. Apparently the dog peed on an aide’s designer handbag; ‘mounted’ a stool made from the foot of an elephant shot by former US president Theodore Roosevelt, and did his business at a Cabinet meeting. Now that Number 10 finally has a top dog, he should be given an award – not a telling off.