Fran Rooney resigns as director of Goal

A PROMINENT director of the humanitarian agency Goal has resigned amid complaints over “corporate management issues” at the charity.

Fran Rooney, former chief executive of the Football Association of Ireland, resigned yesterday after only 3½ months in the position.

His departure followed that of senior counsel Ken Fogarty, who was chairman of the board and left the charity two weeks ago. Both men were appointed in August after five directors had resigned.

Mr Fogarty resigned his position after a disagreement with the charity’s chief executive and founder John O’Shea about changes to corporate governance he was trying to introduce in the organisation.

In August this year, the board’s chairman Jerry Sheehan stepped down along with directors Andy Butler, Conor Sparks and David Allman. Former director John Wilson resigned in January. They were replaced by Mr Fogarty, Mr Rooney, David Ringrose, PJ Cunningham, Cliona Hartigan and Vincent Hogan, who joined existing director Brian MacMahon.

In a statement issued yesterday, Mr Rooney said Mr O’Shea had personally “abused” Mr Fogarty. He also said Mr O’Shea had suggested to others that Mr Fogarty had resigned as a result of “pressure of work” and “this was clearly not the case”.

Speaking to The Irish Timeslast night, Mr Fogarty said he had unearthed "a number of corporate management issues" at the charity that had to be addressed and had set a target of the end of the year for the changes to be introduced.

However it became clear management were not as engaged as he had hoped and the target would not be met. He agreed Mr O’Shea had verbally abused him ahead of a board meeting in November and said it became obvious the trust between them was gone.

“I wasn’t very impressed with the way it was meted out at the time, but we concluded the exchange by shaking hands.”

He said other board members had been made aware of the “legal and administrative pitfalls” at the charity and he believed the changes he had sought would be introduced, but it would just take longer. The charity’s structure had been fit for purpose in 1977, but the world was a different place now, he said. He described Mr O’Shea as an “extremely passionate man” and said such people did not always have time for “niceties”.

A Goal spokesman said it would not be making any comment.