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AN ELEPHANT GIVEN as a gift to President Patrick Hillery in 1979 led to a diplomatic row between Ireland and Tanzania.
Details of the bizarre dispute were revealed in documents released to the National Archives which show that the government refused to pay the cost of shipping the elephant to Ireland.
Tanzania is home to the diverse wilderness of Serengeti National Park and Hillery visited the country during his first of two terms as President.
Hillery was presented with a live elephant as a gift by President Julius Nyerere and it was transported to Dublin Zoo in May 1980.
The three-year-old elephant was named Mimi and she was subsequently moved to Southampton Zoo two years later.
Months after Mimi’s arrival in Dublin Zoo, however, the Tanzanian government wrote to the Irish Embassy in Dar es Salaam seeking reimbursement of the transport costs.
“The Embassy will recall that the Government of Ireland undertook to pay air freight charges in respect of the one live elephant which was presented to the President of the Republic of Ireland as a gift from the President of the United Republic of Tanzania,” a Tanzanian official wrote according to correspondence released by Department of Foreign Affairs.
It is in accordance with this undertaking that the Ministry has the honour to request the reimbursement of the sum of 66,063 Tanzanian shilling, it being the cost of transporting by air the live elephant referred to above.
Irish diplomats were not able to verify whether the Ireland had agreed to pay for the cost of transporting the elephant and the issue was passed to the Department of Foreign Affairs.
The DFA further contacted the Department of An Taoiseach, saying it did not have the funds to pay for the transfer of the elephant in any case.
Bloodlines
The incident was not the only unusual gift Hillery was given during his time as President.
In 1984, leading British racehorse owner Robert Sangster offered to provide one of his stallions for a private liaison with a particular mare in the State-owned Irish National Stud.
The offer required that any offspring from the equine coupling could only run in the President’s colours and that Sangster would be credited for the gift.
President Hillery accepted the gift and and in a memo from his secretary to the Department of An Taoiseach it was noted that an urgent response was required as the mare was ready for service.
Great idea fair play. Now if we could just get people to stop littering in the first place….
All suggestions welcome.
Make people who are caught littering have to pick up litter for a week. A lot to be said for community service.
Yep don’t litter ! Or else big Paul gonna sort ya out.
People who use selfie sticks need to be excommunicated from society.
Public crime deserves public shaming. Saturday and Sunday in a busy mainstreet near there home. With their name on a bib . Put them in the paper or on tv after the angelus. They do it in Bolivia for a host of offences. Just need wardens on commission to enforce it. Draconian but I bet it would work.
Take more than a weekend. All sponsored by a tax exile
The tax exile that puts money directly into the community and charities alike whilst bypassing bankers paydays?
Fair play to JP, Paul O’Connell and everyone involved in this idea. Ideally something like this shouldn’t be needed, great getting the people of Limerick together and invoke a community spirit that has disappeared in recent years. Good to see Limerick in the media for a feel good story like this instead of the usual portrayal by the national media.
Well done Limerick. Great idea for getting people out and about and working as a community.
Great work Paul
Well done to all involved and the weather is also improving…it will be a beautiful weekend in Lovely Limerick
I’ve often wondered couldn’t the authorities request all the customers from the bin collection services and anyone who isn’t paying to have their rubbish taken away be questioned as to what they are doing with it? I mean it’s a disgrace we have a beautiful countryside and its being ruined.
Great to see. As generations have passed I have felt we’re all getting a little more self involved and losing what made /makes Ireland great, community spirit. Activities like this make you proud in a way that maybe we’ve still got it.
I recommend anyone should do a clean up with their local tidy towns at least once to see what people do to our countryside!
We talk about promoting Ireland as a place for tourists and for business yet we have one hand tied behind our back with people who throw out rubbish from their cars etc into the hedgerows and verges of our roads!
Not one word about JP McManus???
He’s mentioned in the piece, Danny
Jp donated 150,000e to the cause and help organise high visi vests and paying Mr binman to collect the rubbish
Thats not me at all. I was in Dublin today giving Joan one
A great day for Limerick.
A great idea! Should be done every year in the future.
JP and Paul are a credit to Limerick.
Well done!
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