A Co Fermanagh councillor has written to the UK government in a bid to have a table that was used at the G8 summit held there in 2013 to be returned.
The locally made wooden table was built ahead of the conference attended by world leaders at the Lough Erne Resort. Former US President Barack Obama, Prime Minister David Cameron and Russian leader Vladimir Putin were all in attendance.
However, Erne East Sinn Féin councillor Sheamus Greene said the area was promised benefits in terms of legacy projects following the summit, which never materialised. Following last week’s meeting of the now G7 leaders in Germany, Cllr Greene reiterated his desire for the table to be returned.
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“I was in the old Fermanagh council in the build up to the G8 summit and there was all sorts of people in giving presentations and talking about how everything was going to be of benefit to Fermanagh. It was almost like holding an Olympics they said.
“I was very sceptical of it and told them that I didn’t believe a word of it, and I didn’t think there would be any benefits whatsoever. And that turned out to be the case.
“There was talk about an Enniskillen bypass, about a tourism project like a water park. At the time they quoted us figures of £650 million worth of benefits to the region.
“They had commissioned this table, sourced from local material and lo and behold, not only was there no water park or bypass, they threw the table in the back of the truck and took it with them.
“All of them promises and things that they said, they broke them all and even took the table. It’s really not entirely about the table but it’s just to highlight what went on at that time."
Sheamus penned his letter straight to embattled UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, but has yet to receive a response. Johnson has been rocked by a series of resignations from his cabinet in recent days.
“I like to raise it every now and then so people can remember how badly conned a lot of people were in this part of the world," Sheamus added.
“I wrote a letter to Downing Street and pointed out to Boris that there probably had been a number of fairly good and boisterous parties there over the last couple of years around this table.
“Even if there were any scratches or damages on it, I would be happy to foot the bill for repairing them if it was returned to Fermanagh.”
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