THE STATUE OF Molly Malone located on Dublin’s Suffolk Street has been vandalised with paint for a second time.

Last week the statue’s chest area was covered in black paint, while a similar incident today involved the words “7 years bad luck” being painted in green over black paint on the statue’s chest and plaque.

Molly Malone was a semi historical figure made famous by the song ‘Cockles and Mussels’.

The graffiti’s mention of luck and its placement on the statue’s chest may be a reference to the practice of tourists rubbing Molly Malone’s chest area in the belief it will them good luck.

Ray McAdam, a Fine Gael councillor for the North Inner City, told The Journal that it was a “childish” act and “frustrating” that a tourist attraction would be vandalised twice in such a short period.

Sasko Lazarov Sasko Lazarov

“I don’t get who or what or why somebody feels the need to do this, why they want to do this. It just baffles me to be perfectly honest,” he said.

The statue was commissioned and designed in 1988 and placed on Grafton Street before being moved just over 100 metres away to its current location to allow for the building of new Luas tracks.

“I’m sure that many Dubliners will be will be scratching their heads when they hear this news. I remember in Sheriff Street when the Luke Kelly statue was repeatedly vandalised, the locals down there were just perplexed and couldn’t understand why people feel the need to do this,” he said.

McAdam added that he would be open to moving the statue back to Grafton Street if it might make the statue less vulnerable to attacks.

“I have faith that Gardaí will be able to use CCTV to identify whether this was the same individual, or group of individuals, involved in the previous occasion.”

McAdam said that he expected the city council to clean up the paint as soon as possible.