Vincent Browne meets Klaus Masuch

THOSE bailout bankers must love their jaunts over here.

The Troika team have been and gone, leaving us with an assuring pat on the back.

The message as they packed their bags was: 'You’re on track and keep

up the good work.'

Sinn Fein’s Mary Lou McDonald, for one, wasn’t impressed and scoffed

that the good boys and girls in Government got a big gold medal on

their copybooks…for hammering us with austerity cutbacks.

But the bigwigs from Brussels and Frankfurt reckoned everything was

going great when they sauntered over from their plush Merrion Hotel

base to Euro Commission HQ.

These guys are normally faceless men in grey suits who jet into

financial trouble spots with fat cheque books.

But they know that their slice of the action will be very rewarding

indeed, and they don’t court publicity especially when confronted with

the unrest that economic collapse whips up in places like Greece.

So it must have been with some sense of comfort that they were

confronted by a motley crew of just half a dozen protesters at their

press conference.

Had they strolled deeper into the city centre however, they would have

come across more than a thousand teachers, parents, and schoolkids

massing outside the Department of Education in rage over cuts.

Undeterred, the trio settled in for what is normally a mundane

assessment of the country’s progress in meeting tough targets to

rescue us from ruin.

But this, the fifth review, was different, something completely

different to coin a phrase that will become apparent..

If it wasn’t so serious, some of the exchanges could be described as a

descent into comic farce.

For those of you who view all this a bit of a circus, well it was

certainly was…Monty Python’s Flying Circus, that is.

The scene was set when the usually dour officials loosened up a bit to

praise what they saw as our national resilience…and even tried to

uncharacteristically crack a joke or two.

Granted, the International Monetary Fund’s Craig Beaumont maintained a

fairly, err, shall we say, austere demeanour, but how his colleagues

made merry.

The European Commission director Istivan Szekely quipped about how

skillful we Irish were at accessing his email address and told how he

got so many encouraging messages.

The European Central Bank’s Klaus took the biscuit when he revealed

how he discussed our national crux between the airport and his hotel

with cab drivers who show a remarkable understanding of complex

economics.

It was all too much for the valiant Vincent Browne, who wanted to know

if his taxi man told him how bewildered taxpayers were at having to

cough up billions of euro to bondholders at the former Anglo Irish

Bank.

As a wrestling match loomed for possession of the microphone, the

broadcaster bellowed: “This financial institution I’m talking about is

defunct. It’s over. It’s finished.”

And there you have it, Vincent Browne had turned into John Cleese

waving his dead Norwegian Blue parrot at the pet shop owner.

He was only short of pronouncing: ‘Anglo Irish has passed on, is no

more, has ceased to be, expired and gone to meet its maker.

‘If you hadn't nailed Sean FitzPatrick to the perch he'd be pushing up

the daisies!’

Poor Klaus must have been pinning for the fjords himself as he needed

the help of Dublin’s Commission head Barbara Nolan to quickly move

proceedings along.

The redoubtable Browne was determined to have the last word and

blasted on behalf of the oppressed: “This isn’t, this isn’t good

enough.

“You people are intervening in this society causing huge damage by

requiring us to make payments not for the benefit of anybody in

Ireland but for the benefit of European financial institutions.”

I’m told by my spies in Washington that IMF chief Ajai the Chopper

Chopra quite enjoys his trips to Dublin and is looking forward to the

next one.

If he’s back for the next quarterly round-up, he’ll have his charges

on strict instructions to lay off the wise cracks.

Especially if Browne is around.

ENDS