Noírín O’Sullivan’s inability to recall Maurice McCabe affair
“Some of her evidence on the matter, however, was curious.”
Michael Clifford exercises a remarkable empathy and restraint, when parsing and probing Noírín O’Sullivan’s evidence to the Disclosures Tribunal — ‘Questions persist over O’Sullivan’s evidence’ (Irish Examiner, January, 24).
‘Curious’ is surely a benign way of describing the former Commissioner’s blatant fudging of her recall of the strategies and events surrounding key elements of the McCabe affair.
It’s always surprising (or perhaps not anymore) how contorted and camouflaged senior gardaí become when pressed for truth, facts and precise details of events.
Given that they have come up through the ranks, having presumably seen it all, heard it all and ‘done it all’, they are all remarkably unaware, unalert and lacking in any credibly transparent narrative.
No doubt they have all sought such factual transparency from suspects and victims throughout their long careers, yet are perennially unable to cough up anything like the truth, the real and nothing but the truth.
Perhaps it’s a universal tactic employed by all senior police officers worldwide, one designed to shroud their activities in mystique and ‘curious’ majesty.
Seems more like simply avoiding being caught out for the cornucopia of their errors, manipulations and patent mistakes of the darker variety.
One might have thought that officers would lean more to true facts, openly telling the unvarnished, unadulterated authentic narrative to clear up the case with aplomb as quickly as possible.
Not so, it seems. It’s all about careerism, self-aggrandisement, corruptive practice with attendant cover-up strategies, and blatant ‘fibbery’.
Ms O’Sullivan’s regular jaunty presentations to tribunals, Dáil committees and the like, coupled with the ‘fear grin’ grimacing fools no-one... except maybe herself.
