Portlaoise was looking forward to hosting the Taiwan Special Olympics team, now its work seems to have been in vain, writes James Fitzgerald
After 18 months of preparations, €30,000 worth of fundraising, and the mobilisation of hundreds of eager volunteers, the town of Portlaoise must now resign itself to the fact that it is unlikely to be welcoming the Taiwan team for the upcoming Special Olympics World Games in June.
As the town came to terms with the news, the Portlaoise organising committee yesterday called on Health Minister Micheál Martin to clarify what it called a "baffling" decision to ask the Taiwan team to withdraw. Margaret Ryan, spokeswoman for the committee, said that for the Minister's decision to be justified, he must have had information that the rest of the country and the World Health Organisation (WHO) was not privy to.
"I would love to hear his reason for stopping 80 people from Taiwan, but not all the others, who we don't know about, coming in from that country," she said. "I think clarification is needed because it really is quite baffling and confusing."
Ryan added that if it was necessary for the Minister to keep the Taiwan team out of Ireland then surely there should be a total ban on anyone coming from that part of the world.
The Taiwan team, consisting of 69 athletes and 11 coaches and other delegates, was due to arrive in Portlaoise on Monday, June 16th for the four-day host town orientation programme, ahead of the Games's opening ceremony in Dublin on Saturday, June 21st.
Almost every movement of the athletes had been carefully planned, including trips to nearby Finlay Farm, Abbeyleix Sensory Gardens, Emo Court stately home and shopping excursions, as well as the offer of last-minute training in the various local sports clubs and societies that had offered their facilities free of charge. The committee easily raised the €30,000 necessary to fund the Taiwan team's stay through a single event - a gala ball - supported chiefly by the corporate interests in the town.
"It's a huge disappointment for the whole town of Portlaoise. Everyone was really looking forward to welcoming the athletes and the business community will lose out as well," said Ryan.
One of those businesses is the Heritage Hotel, which had been block-booked to accommodate the entire delegation. A spokeswoman for the hotel said that she would be disappointed if the Taiwanese athletes did not come, but that no official cancellation of the booking had been made.
Meanwhile, the likely cancellation has saddened others in the town. Ye Dda Yan (34) works at the Royal China restaurant on Bank Place, not far from the team's would-be base at the Heritage. Although a native of the Fujian province of China, she is one of the few people in Portlaoise who can speak the Taiwanese dialect that many of the delegation would understand. She had been drafted in by the organisers to help break down the language barrier as it was understood that many of the Taiwanese athletes and trainers would not have much English.
"I was going to help but now I can't - it's a shame but I think it was right to stop them from coming because SARS is very easy to pass on," she said after yesterday's lunchtime rush at the restaurant had died down.
Another Portlaoise resident who agrees with the Minister's decision is the mayor and Independent town councillor, Joe McCormack.
"The whole thing is tragic really. The virus is tragic in itself of course, but it seems that Micheál Martin has made an appropriate decision as people are coming from an infected area," said McCormack.
He added that he still had hope that the Taiwan team might yet be given the all-clear before the deadline in advance of the Games.
However, Fiona O'Loughlin, general manager of the Host Town Programme, was not so optimistic. "While there is a distinct possibility that some of the countries will get the all-clear, it is difficult to see Taiwan being one of them as they have the highest number of SARS cases outside of China and Hong Kong," she said. According to official WHO figures, there have been 264 confirmed cases of SARS in Taiwan since the crisis began and 30 deaths. Crucially, health agencies say that Taiwan is now announcing more new cases than Hong Kong, with 26 confirmed on Thursday alone.
Henry Ming Jeng Chen, the Taiwan government's representative in Ireland, had been involved in Portlaoise's preparations for welcoming his countrymen and women to the Midlands. He had planned to spend the entire week in Portlaoise and was intending to host a reception for the team in the Heritage. He had also helped to organise an exhibition of Taiwanese art and culture, an initiative that may still go ahead in the town regardless of these latest developments.
"The delegation is not coming but the friendship between Taiwan and Portlaoise is still there and we want to keep that going," he said. "We will accept the decision by the Government of course but this is not fair to the athletes in Taiwan who have trained so hard. They were willing to quarantine themselves for 14 days and follow all the guidelines. I think it will hurt their feelings - it hurts all our feelings."