[Former Naas Mayor and Fine Gael councillor Darren Scully (pictured at FG HQ, Mount Street, Dublin in 2005) who was forced to resign in 2011 after saying he would not represent ”black African’ constituents. He apologised and returned to Fine Gael last month]

Darren Scully sat down with the University Times to clear the air once and for all about his real feelings toward ‘black Africans’…

“I had met a lot of people, particularly from the black community, who were looking for a lot — demanding a lot — and I was just very unhappy with it — the way they were dealing with it.”

“After the event [his resignation], the good thing that came out of all this, was that I was contacted by a lot of groups and organisations, particularly from the African community themselves. I met with a few individuals, and it’s kind of funny: I met with one gentleman who was from Uganda, and he said to me if you had said that you wouldn’t deal with any more Nigerians, you would have been perfect, you know? He said ‘we’re Ugandans and we hate Nigerians’. Same way other people from other African countries say ‘we hate Nigerians’ because of the way they come across: their cultures, their traditions.”

“I said black Africans. Now I really shouldn’t have even said black Africans. I should have said certain people from a certain part of Africa. That’s what I should have said. And the mistake was that I generalised. I said all black Africans. And that was a mistake. But I had issues, issues with certain nationalities, which I’m not going to discuss now. There’s no point. Certain nationalities from the continent of Africa who are very demanding. And I had been thrown the race card several times. Now, I don’t like that. I don’t like being bullied and threatened by any person. And that’s what really kind of annoyed me.”

 

That’s cleared that up then.

More here: Delicate Recollection (Edmund Heaphy, The University Times)

Previously: Darren Scully on broadsheet

(Graham Hughes/Photocall Ireland)

Thanks Leanna Byrne