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TWENTY years ago, the maternity unit at Ennis General Hospital was closed and since then, the only babies born in Clare are to the few women who hire independent midwives for home births, and those women who do not make it to hospital and give birth at the side of the road. A new group, Birth Choice Clare, has launched a cam- paign for the es- tablishment of a midwife led, com- munity based, stand-alone ma- ternity — facility in Ennis to serve the more than 105,000 ~~‘ popu- lation of Clare. Because 85 to 90 per cent of births are normal, mem- bers say such a midwife led unit would be as suc- CIAO MECISMECIDOOUUEADE units in the UK and elsewhere. Birth Choice Clare says women and their babies should not be subjected to the dangers of roadside births un-

necessarily and travelling from some parts of the county could involve journeys of up to two hours, depend- ing on traffic.

The campaign will be highlighted this Sunday, June 3, in a special re- port on RTE’s regional and commu- nity affairs programme,

NEXT bank holiday Monday why not relax in the name of a good cause.

A local branch of Aids Partnership with Africa (APA) will hold a pam- pering day and craft fair fundraiser at the West County Hotel on June 4. The aim of the event is to raise mon- ey for Aids orphan programmes in Ethiopia and Tanzania.

A wide range of relaxing pamper- ing treatments from Indian head massage to hand and foot reflexology will be available on the day. Entry fee 1s €30 and once inside patrons can sample as many of the therapies on offer as they wish.

Among the services available are a number of health and exercise thera-

pies such as African reflexology, iri- dology, angel card readings, bio-en- ergy, reiki, metamorphic technique, integrated energy, Bowen therapy and transference healing.

Life coaches and beauty consult- ants will also be on hand to provide one-to-one Sessions.

There will also be plenty of musical entertainment, helping to enhance an atmosphere of relaxation and heal- ing.

A craft fair showcasing the tal- ents of local craft workers will open at llam. All items are hand made and will be on sale. The pampering therapies begin at lpm and run until BET

There is a serious side to the day with all proceeds from the event

going towards the Irish registered charity APA, to help fund projects in Ethiopia and Tanzania. Fr Owen Lambert, a Holy Ghost priest, set up APA in 2002.

Having worked in east Africa for over 30 years he witnessed first hand the devastating effect the Aids pan- demic was having on whole commu- nities.

He was particularly touched by the plight of children orphaned by AIDS. In response to their growing plight he established the APA. Its policy is to work in partnership with governments, both at local and na- tional levels.

It funds leadership and training to facilitate communities to respond to the Aids crisis in a local and sustain-

able way, respecting religious beliefs, values and principles.

APA also funds HIV/Aids infor- mation and prevention programmes. However the main focus is on Aids orphaned children.

Where possible these children are re-united with a member of their extended family otherwise they are cared for by foster families.

The APA programme subsidizes these foster families to provide the children with food, shelter, education and a chance to live a dignified life. All the proceeds of the Ennis pam- pering day will go towards the Aids orphans programmes in Ethiopia and Tanzania.

For more information log onto WWw.apa.ie

BY 6pm, Clare’s largest polling sta- tion was humming. The flow of vot- ers had been steady all day at Ennis CBS, but now business was really picking up.

The narrow hallways rumbled with the purposeful steps of voters. Out- side cars and SUV’s were plonked on the footpath. Inside the walls, others jostled for parking spaces.

Normally you’d associate this kind of traffic with the daily school com- mute taken by parents and children to and from New Road.

But today there’s a different reason for the hustle and bustle. It’s Election Day.

Time to chose the men or women that will serve Clare in the 30th Dail. And the people are eager to have Dales DMITRY

“Oh it’s always this way,” says Cen- tre Supervisor Anne Monahan. Pre- siding officer Lawrence O’ Loughlin concurs, “You’ll always find it like that.”

Between them, Anne and Lawrence have over 50 years experience at the polling stations. Steady hands on hec- tic days. 3,800 voters drawn mainly

from the Tulla Road and Roslevan areas of the town passed through the CBS last Thursday.

Seven individual stations were di- vided between two buildings. The booths propped neatly in classrooms in the main building. Three more ar- ranged in a circle in a separate hall.

The school also housed the busi- est polling booth in the county – box number two where 860 of the coun- ty’s 79,883 potential votes were cast.

Anne checked the first polling fig- ures at 2pm and already turnout was high, at 18 per cent. By 6pm that fig- ure had risen to 30 per cent.

A staff of 15 people sat through the long hours of voting, making sure everything ran smoothly. A good thing too.

A power cut struck parts of Ennis on Thursday. Electronic voting may- be quick, easy and less cumbersome, but what happens when the lights go oD nia

‘That would be an absolute disas- ter. No one would be able to vote,” says Anne.

While we await the winner of the pencil versus keypad debate, there will still be plenty of work for pre- siding officers at election time.

For Lawrence, that means rising in the early light of 6.30am. The day isn’t done until 10.30pm when the last of the all-important ballot boxes are under lock and key in the West County Hotel.

It’s a day for people and their pri- orities. After a 15-hour day, there’s only one place the Boston, Tubber native is thinking of.

“It’s a long day alright. I remember we had a long one a few years ago. It will take about a half an hour to clean up. I’ll be aiming to hit Rory Kenny’s by twenty past eleven’, says Lawrence.

A MAN who called gardai “paedo- philes” did so because of a previous incident, a court has heard.

Maurice Walsh (57), of Finian Park, Shannon, appeared in court last week, charged under the Public Order Act.

Shannon District Court was told the accused called gardai “paedophiles and c****s” and accused one garda of setting him up for drink driving, on March 3 last.

Defending solicitor Tara Godfrey said the accused’s wife is deceased. This date would have been her 50th birthday. He drank too much alcohol and became emotional, she said.

Judge Aeneas McCarthy asked, ‘“What’s his problem with gardai?”

Ms Godfrey replied, “I think it’s his problem with the world at large.”

At that stage the accused addressed the judge.

“What have I got against the gardai? Four years ago, I was inside in Ennis General Hospital, having two operations carried out and while I was having the operations carried out, gardai arrived at my house with a search warrant, on the pretence I was after stealing a Kawasaki motor- bike from Sixmilebridge,” he said.

The judge told him that was a mat- ter for the Garda Complaints Board. The accused said he had made a complaint, but the garda officer who investigated it found there had been no wrongdoing.

The case was adjourned for a Pro- ley 1h(O0 Ke) Lam

SHARON Shannon returns to north Clare early next month for a spe- cial once-off concert in support of Ennistymon’s Mol an Oige Steiner school.

The trad legend will play an inti- mate concert at the Falls Hotel and Spa Resort on Thursday, June 7, along with her sister Mary and Jim Murray on guitar.

Renowned in the past for taking on causes such as animal welfare, the Ruan musician has joined the likes of the Frank and Walters in putting on support concerts for the school.

“We are absolutely thrilled to have

Sharon coming up and putting on a concert. It’s areal boost for the school to have someone of her calibre who is willing to get behind it and help,” said Mary Fahy of Mol an Oige.

‘There is a great buzz around about it already, even the young kids are getting excited about it. Tickets are selling out so quickly and we would advise people to get theirs sooner jel elo) mm Oe- DOM Esl Kos ie

Also appearing on the night will be vocalist and guitarist Jack Maher, Eoin O’Neill, Quentin Cooper, Tara Connaghan and Jon O’Connell from The Walls.

All proceeds from the concert will go directly to the Mol An Oige

primary school, which does not, at present, receive any government funding. The school instead relies heavily on fundraising events and donations to cover the costs of run- ning the school.

‘Numbers are good at the moment. We have 40 children attending which is all that we can accommodate.

‘Numbers are high for next year and the year after already. The local community is really getting behind the school,” continued Mary.

‘Fundraisers like this are essential for wages, for classes and for equip- ment.

“We have had a lot of donations from local businesses, and local

craftspeople have been doing a lot of work at the school for free.

‘The fundraising is essential. We wouldn’t be able to survive without it.”

Tickets, as a cost of €25, can be bought in Ennistymon from the Falls Hotel itself, Daly’s Bar and Unglert’s Bakery as well as from the Celtic t- shirt shop in Lahinch.

Custy’s music shop in Ennis and Record Rack (065 6820769) will take credit card bookings.

The Falls Hotel has accommoda- tion on offer on the night and can be contacted on 065 7071004 for all overnight booking requirements.

POLITICAL graffiti artists have tar- geted some 50 General Election post- ers in the north Clare area in an act of political ‘jamming’.

The effected posters, which are di- vided indiscriminately across all po- litical parties and candidates, feature a pair of false cartoon eyes stuck on the candidates’ faces, as well as the words “Obey Me’ embossed on their Ke)Ko store OMOmonvne

Jamming is a form of graffiti in which the artist targets public adver- tisements or political posters in order to express a political or moral point.

The posters are located in the Lahi- nch, Ennistymon and Inagh areas but

a number can also be seen on the In- agh Road in Ennis.

The process of jamming has become more commonplace in Irish elections in recent years. The most high-pro- file recent example of jamming took place in Cork City during the 2002 local election.

On that occasion, brown paper en- velopes were attached to hundreds of Fianna Fail and Fine Gael election posters in the centre of Cork City on the night before the election.

A Cork-based anarchist organisation later claimed responsibility for this stunt which was part of its ‘anti-elec- tion’ campaign. To date, no-one has claimed responsibility for the north Clare jamming.

According to the Head of Psychol- ogy at the University of Limerick, Tony Cassidy, the graffiti is actually a positive sign.

“It does represent some disillusion- ment with the state of politics in the area, but it is actually a quite positive thing that people are willing to put that much time and effort into mak- ing a political statement,’ said Dr Cassidy. “It shows a level of disillu- sionment with the system, but it also shows that the people involved have a will to make their voices heard. It is quite a positive thing in that respect.”

Meanwhile, Fine Gael candidate Pat Breen has described as “politically motivated” the destruction of his bill- board in the outskirts of Kilrush just

hours after it was erected.

The €60, eight-by-four-foot bill- board, which was erected on Saturday evening, was discovered on Sunday in an adjacent field.

The board, which was promoting Fine Gael’s commitment to accident and emergency services in Ennis with a picture of Breen’s head, had been de- faced with the TD’s mouth cut away.

Deputy Breen told

MEP Sean O Neachtain was in En- nistymon on Friday to meet with the staff and students of Scoil Mhuire in Ennistymon. The Galway-based MEP was in town to examine the European Studies projects of some 40 students of the school.

O Neachtain is the latest in a series of MEPs to have visited the school in recent years, with Dana and Brian Crowley also paying a visit.

“At the start of the year, we re- ally didn’t know all that much about European studies or how the EU worked. At first we were introduced into the basics of how the parliament is divided and how there is so much

peace between the counties now,” said Hannah O’Brien, from Lahinch.

‘But we were also introduced to the cultural side of it and were allowed to decide what topic we wanted to take on for ourselves.”

The projects ranged from politi- cal issues such as immigration and economic matters to more cultural topics.

“My topic focused on the develop- ment of film in three countries — France, Italy and Spain,” continued Hannah.

“We were given loads of choice as long as it had some connection with the EU. Some people chose more politically-orientated subjects, like for example the inclusion of Turkey

in the EU. If you were good at mu- sic, you could branch off into that or horse riding, whatever, as long as you looked at the cultures of the different countries.

‘“T looked at the beginnings of film, and how things like religion and war effected them. I also looked at the progression to modern day and how European film is now standing up to big Hollywood films.”

Sean O Neachtain was elected as a MEP for the north and west region in 2004. He currently sits on commit- tees for fisheries, transport and tour- ism and is a substitute on the com- mittee on the budget.

“I guess I wouldn’t have known who Sean Neachtain was this time last

year,’ Hannah continued. “Now we know what he looks like at least. No, we also know a lot more about the work he does and how it all works. We all definitely have a better idea of it now than we had coming into the year. I see how Ireland has benefited so much in term of funding and how the EU has promoted so much over there.”

DOONBEG will play host to Irish and international musicians over the June bank holiday weekend when the eight International Jazz Festival comes to town.

The popular annual event attracts as many as 2,000 visitors to Doon- beg with its mix of swing, dixie and jazz and this year’s programme will suit all tastes with performers from Luxembourg, Germany, Poland, England, Guatemala, and Ireland.

Committee member, Philippa Sea- grist, said that the festival has gone from strength to strength over the years.

‘It has been a slow process but we

are getting a good reputation. The festival is not about heavy jazz but a lively jazz mix. We are just final- ising the last details now and we’re hoping for lovely weather like the last Whit weekend,” she said.

Philippa added that all the events are free despite the “miniature” budget and most will take place nightly in local bars before a hoped for “spill” of the crowd onto the streets for the final day.

The festival will officially open in The Igoe Inn on Friday night and there will also be a Saturday after- noon jazz ‘jam’ session.

The festival will have many high- lights this year including Edith van den Heuvel and Dany Schwickerath

with songs from The American Songbook, as well as modern jazz tunes from Horace Silver and Th- elonious Monk.

Manu and his Latino House is a showcase of international musi- cians who have joined with Manu Ramirez from Guatemala to make an exciting Latin-Dance fusion with Afro- Caribbean influences. They have appeared at the Gaiety Theatre Latin Club, The Temple Bar Music Centre, Half Moon Club and the Cork Jazz Festival.

The Portobello Jazzband from London will bring the flavour of New Orleans to west Clare with their six piece Dixie Band.

Flying the Irish flag will be The

Jazzberries a Dublin based duo who have been entertaining their audiences since 2002, playing jazz standards and swing as well as mod- ern tunes with a jazz twist.

The East Coast Jazz Band from Arklow are an exciting five-piece band playing popular jazz, bossa and blues and have appeared at the Cork Jazz Festival for the last 10 Nerd ase

Local band Skazz will be enter- taining with their unique mix of jazz, reggae and ska, fresh from be- ing voted ‘Best Band’ at Cork’s Bal- lydehob Jazz Festival. Limerick’s David Irwin Trio and Spilt Ends will also make highly anticipated appearances.

FORGET the general election, it’s the European Union that has been cap- turing the imagination of students in north Clare over the past few weeks.

Mary Immaculate Secondary School in Lisdoonvarna and Scoil Mhuire in Ennistymon have taken part in a number of exciting interna- tional events all centered around Eu- rope Day and the 50th anniversary of the EU.

First came Dublin, and a mock sit- ting of the European Council featur- ing the fifth-year students from Mary Immaculate.

The students, who were the only

ones from Clare chosen to take part, were asked to represent the Europe- an Commission on the day and pre- sented a report on global warming and terrorism.

Thirteen students from Mary Im- maculate were then joined by 12 more from Scoil Mhuire for a Eu- ropean trip to take part in the Euro Schola programme.

The students, along with teach- ers Marian O’Callaghan, Mary O’Flaherty and Helen Cleary, joined 650 students from every corner of Europe who took over the EU Parlia- ment in Strasbourg for a day.

“We found the discussion very good, especially in term of the dif-

ferent languages,’ said Marian O’Callaghan from Mary Immaculate Secondary School in Lisdoonvarna.

‘Each student received a certificate and this was the first time that they were printed in Irish. Later in the af- ternoon, there was a mini quiz with questions in all different languages.

‘The students had to go around and try and communicate with people from other countries to find out what the questions meant.

‘There was an Irish question so we were very much in demand from the 0) ates mi AUCOCo LAS

“Fifth-year student, Daniel Col- lin, then addressed the parliament in Irish, which was a very proud mo-

ment for all of us.”

Ennistymon’s Aisling Geraghty was also given the chance to address the Parliament.

“We went over as acting MEPs for the day. We were broken into dif- ferent groups, discussing different topics. The group I was in was En- vironment, Energy and Transport,’ she said.

“IT was chosen as president of my committee and had to report back to the parliament in the evening. It was scary, but it was a brilliant experience as well. I was asked questions from the house and it was really exciting. It would give you a real insight and wake you up to that sort of career.”

THE Kilrush Family Resource Cen- tre will hold a day-long conference on all aspects of family health from 10am to 5pm on Saturday, May 26.

All interested parties can attend the free event, which will involve half- hour talks about everything from nutrition to sexually transmitted in- fections.

Development worker Viv Rooney outlined the speakers and topics lined up for the day.

“A representative from the HSE who is going to talk about healthy eating and cessation of smoking will attend. There will be a breast checker and someone from the Marie Keat- ing Foundation talking about cancer awareness. Staff from the Red Rib- bon Project will be there to address sexual health. We have two women from the Shannon Youth Service looking at relationships and STIs Koren

There will also be a public health nurse giving an update on their ac-

tivities in Clare, a spokesperson from Clare Haven will talk about the ef- fects of domestic violence as well as speakers on family planning, repro- ductive health and complimentary health.

Ms Rooney said that this is the big- gest event of its type staged by the family resource centre and it has been in the planning stages since January.

“This event is part of our three year plan because we wanted to do something around the area of health awareness and promotion. We all

talked about it and decided a confer- ence would be a good way to do it. It will be a great day – very interest- ing. There are lots of different talks and we will change topics quickly so that we can cover a snippet of every- den eetoaa

Numbers are not strictly limited but booking is needed, ideally before Spm on Tuesday, May 22 (today), so that lunch can be provided for every- one on the day. For information con- tact Kilrush Family Resource Centre on 065 9052173.