This article is from page 16 of the 2006-06-20 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 16 JPG
MIKE McTIGUE was never afraid to say he was a Charlie Haughey man. He arose and followed Charlie many years ago and his admiration stayed true, through thick and thin.
Down the years, his sculpting skills also paid tribute to the lost leader of Fianna Fáil. Only last year, he was commissioned to sculpt a limestone plinth for a bold relief of the former Taoiseach down in Dingle. It wasn’t the first time that McTigue’s craft honoured Haughey. When he retired as Taoiseach in early 1992, McTigue was also on hand to mark the occasion.
McTigue was on the national executive at the time. He recalls two meetings as Haughey’s reign was coming to an end.
“Two nights after Sean Doherty made his allegations about phonetapping, he chaired a national executive meeting. People were calling for Charlie’s head – the PDs and the media. But in the meeting. he was calm and said, ‘It’s not the PDs, or the media, it’s the enemy from within’. You could hear a pin drop when he said it. Albert Reynolds and Padraig Flynn were sitting behind him.
“Then he chaired his last meeting in Leinster House, the meeting that ratified Albert Reynolds as Taoiseach. When Charlie’s business was done, he got up, gave a little bow like he always did and walked out. General secretary, Frank Wall, was behind as he always was. There was a sense of history passing that day.”