Thurles wakes up to life without a minister

THE fairy lights were being put up in the square, but no one felt in the Christmas spirit. "It's a death in the family," Mr Jim Kennedy, a Thurles businessman, said yesterday as his home town woke up to life without a minister.

Not just any minister, mind. This was the consensus in Holy Cross, Templemore and Thurles, capital of North Tipperary, as people emerged from Mass, or met in streets and pubs and houses to discuss the only news.

"You should have seen this town after the closure of the sugar factory," Mr Kennedy said. "Community morale was at such a low ebb, and yet it was Lowry who turned it around and had it thriving again."

Feile, when he ran the gauntlet of the clergy to pay off a GAA Semple Stadium debt; the new third level college; the Lisheen mine project; his classic clinics: at home, the former Minister has already been beatified.

See that statue up there," said one young man in Thurles yesterday as he pointed to the monument to Archbishop Croke, the GAA founder. "There'll be another one to Michael that'll be taller than that."

The word had been out six hours before the resignation, when Mr Lowry did not attend his godmother's funeral in Drumbane on Saturday because he was en route to Dublin. The service was almost over when Father Sean Kennedy conveyed his apologies. The "car" was heading north east.

"A major loss to Tipperary," was how the solicitor and former Fine Gael TD, Mr David Molony, reacted. It was on his premature retirement in 1987 that Mr Lowry; took the party seat.

"I'm very sorry to hear the news," Mr Molony said, when he extended sympathy to the Lowry family. "I know nothing other than what I've read in the papers.

"I understand that the Minister said that he was involved in no irregularities, and has resigned in the interests of the Government, and he is to be commended for taking that stand. I hope that when the dust settles, and he has the opportunity to clarify the matter, that he will return to Government."

A Fine Gael councillor, Ms Mae Quinn, who first ran for local elections with Mr Lowry and Mr Molony in 1979, said she was "stunned."

She had no knowledge of Mr Lowry's personal affairs, nor did anyone in the party. "He had so little time to clarify, but he did the right thing by resigning when he did. The longer he left it, the more harm the innuendo would have done to the Government."

The appointment of Mr Alan Dukes as replacement would be welcome in North Tipperary, she said.

"Alan Dukes made it his business to keep in contact here. He is extraordinarily popular, and this was one of the constituencies most vehemently opposed to him going as party leader after the 1990 presidential election."

"A very great loss to Fine Gael, to North Tipp, to the country," said Mr Ailbe Allen, former party organiser and director of elections for the constituency, who had seen Mr Lowry top the poll in 1992 with over 7,000 first preference votes.

"I've worked with him as a TD and I've always found him to be straight, honest, hardworking, and I can't imagine him being involving in any impropriety. In time he'll clear his name.

The sympathy crossed party and constituency divides, with only Fianna Fail throwing in a sharp barb. The Labour Party TD, Mr John Ryan of Nenagh, who will not be standing in the next election, described the former Minister as an excellent public representative, who was a good friend, diligent and a particularly effective Cabinet Minister.

Mr William Kinnane of Tipperary town, who is attached to the West Tipperary Enterprise Group, described the former minister as "very professional" and said his influence had been felt north and south. "They don't make them like him anymore," he said.

The president of Thurles Chamber of Commerce, Mr John Gleeson, who said that he was speaking in a purely "non political" sense, described Mr Lowry's departure as a sad loss. He had been a "key figure" in ensuring that the planned third level college - on the back burner for over 10 years - was expedited.

Young Mass goers such as Mr Brendan O'Dwyer (23) of Athnid, Thurles, felt the State would lose. "My family is Fianna Fail, but Michael Smith is a waste of time. I've voted Lowry, and will continue to. He got money circulating again."

Mr Smith, the former Fianna Fail environment minister and local TD, tempered his sympathies for his colleague with a dig at the coalition Government, which had hit the Irish people "with a series of Scuds".

The "pure mismanagement" by the administration over the last few months had engendered a "paralysis", he said. Major issues of the day, such as the EU presidency, the Northern talks and the pay talks, were being ignored.

Disquiet within the nursing ranks, extraordinary divisions in the Garda Siochana and unrest in CIE threatened stability, shortened the life of this Government, and hit the "body politic", Mr Smith continued.

The appointment of Alan Dukes had been an exercise in "damage limitation", but it was time the Irish electorate had its say.

"Fianna Fail can't crow," Mr Frank Jordan, public relations officer for the local Fine Gael branch, said as he collected for epilepsy outside Thurles Cathedral.

Many ministers should have resigned over the beef tribunal, in his view. "So we've lost a minister. But look, we've still got a bloody great TD."