POSTERS are an unmissable part of the political landscape in the build up to elections.
Most, if not all, of the sixteen candidates in Donegal have election posters now up on lamp-posts in and around Letterkenny
However, it is a number of home-made placards on lamp posts, which detail ex-Ministers pensions, which have really captured the public’s imagination.
Erected on Wednesday last at six junctions in and around the Cathedral town, the posters are the handy-work of John McDaid (47), who has lived in the outskirts of Letterkenny for the last 15 years.
“I have been back and forward to London since 1989 and I have had a problem for years with the massive pensions ex-Ministers receive in this country so I decided to make some placards and put them on lamp posts around Letterkenny.
“I am just a citizen and not a member of any political party but I believe these grotesque monthly pension payments require greater publicity,” he said.
The posters are located at the Bonagee, Tesco and Mountain Top roundabouts, the Port Road to High Road junction, Port Road (near KFC) and on a lamp post on High Road, opposite Letterkenny University Hospital.
“It took me about two weeks to make them – a lot of trial and error – then when I got to Letterkenny last Wednesday I found I needed to replace some of the cable ties because they wouldn’t fit around certain lamp posts so had to go to a local DIY to get more,” he said.
The pension entitlements of seven former Ministers, namely, Mary Harney, Charlie McCreevy, Dr James McDaid, Mary O’Rourke, Brian Cowen, Alan Dukes and John O’Donoghue are the subject of the posters.
“I thought the placard stating Mary Harney’s pension the ex Health Minister of €11,000 per month opposite Letterkenny Hospital is especially poignant given the current fight by nurses to get a living wage,” he said.
“I just wanted to try and highlight the massive difference between a normal workers monthly take home pay versus these ‘servants of the republic’ and their monthly pensions – not salaries but pensions. And the fact that they get these payments at 55.
“Mary Harney is a young women who is now ‘retired’ to France and we the Irish taxpayer put a €11,000 into her account every month – most likely for the next 30 years. This is wrong. People are having their houses repossessed and losing their medical cards while this ex politician and hundreds like her are winning the lottery every month at the tax payers expense,” Mr McDaid said.