An Irish tycoon campaigns to make Britain pay for slavery

Telecoms mogul Denis O’brien’s plan follows multiple controversies of his own,

Having dedicated much of the past two decades to building his business empire in the Caribbean, Denis O’brien claims people there have a “deep affinity” with his native Ireland.

“Many Irish people were transported to these countries particularly from the west of Ireland. They left Ireland as individuals and arrived as indentured servants,” the telecoms billionaire said in a speech last year.

Founded in 2001, O’brien’s Jamaicabased mobile network, Digicel, now spans more than 30 countries and has annual sales of $550m (£458m).

The company’s charitable foundation has also donated tens of millions of pounds towards development projects and disaster relief, such as the rebuilding of Haiti after the 2010 earthquake – earning him praise from Caribbean politicians.

Now, O’brien wants to use his connections on both sides of the Atlantic to fashion himself a new role – as peacemaker in the thorny diplomatic row over reparations for the transatlantic slave trade.

The 64-year-old, one of Ireland’s richest and most controversial sons, is poised to launch a campaign to pressure former European colonial powers into paying billions towards infrastructure, agriculture and development in the territories they previously occupied.

His campaign, Repair, will set up funds that will decide which projects to back, he said at a conference last week. The tycoon argues Britain, France, Belgium, Holland, Spain and Portugal have “unfinished business” with their former colonies and Ireland can act as an “honest broker” in talks.

“Ingrained in all former colonial countries is a silent but deep-rooted resentment toward their former colonists. Many of them depend on trade and tourism from their former rulers,” O’brien said in the speech last year at Cambridge University.

“For centuries, foreign governments and private companies made huge profits from these colonies while destroying their environment and mistreating people without making any amends. The poverty that these countries inherited from the British and other European powers at the time of independence meant that these regions did not have the stability to move to the next level of growth while at the same time carrying large national debts.

“We must repair the cultural and psychological damage. The destruction and theft of one’s patrimony has an extremely pernicious effect on people’s psyche.

“Reparations for all these countries now would allow them to move to the next level.”

O’brien said his home country was well-placed as peacemaker because of the experience of Irish people who were shipped as prisoners or indentured servants to the Caribbean by the British Empire during the 17th century, claiming their experience was “similar to African slaves” – a comparison that has been discouraged by academics.

It marks a fresh attempt by the former media magnate to reinvent himself after a string of controversies at home, and financial trouble at Digicel.

With a current estimated fortune of €1.1bn (£930m), O’brien got his break selling Ireland’s Esat Telecom to BT for $2.8bn in 2000. He then launched Digicel in Jamaica and steadily expanded the mobile network across the rest of the West Indies, while snapping up interests in the media, construction, energy and property industries in his home country.

He held an almost 30pc stake in Independent News & Media, owner of The Irish Independent, until it was sold to Germany’s Mediahaus for €145m in 2019, as well as a majority interest in Communicorp, the radio group behind the Newstalk, Today FM and Spin stations, before it was sold for €100m to Bauer Media Audio in 2021.

In the wake of the financial crisis, O’brien swooped on several struggling businesses, including events infrastructure firm Actavo. He also owns a minority stake in Glasgow’s Celtic Football Club.

Meanwhile, O’brien enjoyed the role of the jet-setting Davos man, schmoozing at Switzerland’s World Economic Forum. A close friend of Bill and Hillary Clinton, he has lent his private jet to the former US president on several occasions and is reportedly one of the couple’s top political donors.

However, more recently Digicel – of which O’brien remains chairman – has struggled. It was forced to declare bankruptcy and agree to a debt restructuring in 2020, with the tycoon putting up $50m of his own assets. Some of his past business dealings have also come under scrutiny in Ireland. After 14 years of investigation, a tribunal concluded in 2011 that O’brien and Esat had gained an unfair advantage over mobile industry rivals through links with an Irish minister.

Amid a bidding process for the second of Ireland’s lucrative mobile network licences, the tribunal found O’brien had paid Michael Lowry, former communications minister, significant sums of money. Lowry was said to have given the businessman “substantive information” about the bidding process that was “of significant value and assistance to him in securing the licence”.

O’brien has always denied wrongdoing and denounced the tribunal’s findings as a sham. “I wish to state in the most categoric terms once again that I never made any payment to Michael Lowry in his capacity as a government minister, as a public representative or as a private citizen,” he said at the time.

His purchase of Actavo, formerly Siteserv, was also marred in controversy after it emerged the sale of the business by nationalised Angloirish Bank had involved writing off £75m owed to taxpayers.

It prompted questions over whether O’brien had benefited from a sweetheart deal, which are among claims being looked at by an ongoing special commission.

O’brien insisted he had “nothing to hide” and later remarked he had “never experienced the level of abuse, venom and hatred” received when he sought to block media outlets from reporting on leaked details about his financial affairs.

The tycoon’s friendship with the Clintons also made him a target of Donald Trump, with the Republican candidate branding O’brien one of the “most reviled figures in Ireland”. Even on the Celtic stands this year, he has been booed over Actavo’s industrial dispute.

No doubt O’brien will be hoping this doesn’t put off the likes of Boris Johnson, France’s Emmanuel Macron and Spain’s Pedro Sánchez as he seeks backing for his reparations campaign.

He has called for billions of pounds to be agreed and paid over 20 years.

“This is not an Irish man having a rant about Great Britain,” he told the crowd at Cambridge.

“Britain needs to fess up and write the final chapter about colonisation with the proper ink of intent.”

‘The destruction and theft of one’s patrimony has an extremely pernicious effect on people’s psyche’