RTÉ Radio
EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW WITH BILLIONAIRE CHUCK FEENEY ON RTÉ RADIO 1
Publicity-shy, frugal-living, left-of-centre billionaire philanthropist Chuck Feeney gives his first ever in-depth broadcast interview about his life exclusively to Eamon Dunphy this Saturday in RTÉ Radio 1’s Conversations with Eamon Dunphy at 9.10am.
In the interview, he speaks publicly for the first time about the controversy over Ireland’s short lived Centre for Public Inquiry (CPI). Funding of 800,000 dollars for the CPI was withdrawn by Chuck Feeney’s Atlantic Philanthropies in 2004 after the then Justice Minister Michael McDowell raised questions about its director, Frank Connolly.
Chuck Feeney, an American of Irish descent who made his fortune in the 1960s and 1970s in the global duty free industry, decided in 1984 to set up a foundation, Atlantic Philanthropies, to direct funds anonymously to worthy causes, and devote the remainder of his life to giving away his money. The foundation has over the past two decades donated four billion dollars to projects around the world, in countries including the US, Ireland, Vietnam, Cuba, South Africa and Australia. Mr Feeney has donated one billion dollars in grants to Ireland alone, in the form of funding for universities, hospitals, social and community projects.
He became involved in the Irish peace process after watching news of the Enniskillen bomb on television in 1987; “I just thought, this isn’t us. I hadn’t been involved, but I thought, this is something we should get involved in, and I got involved.”
He was involved in talks with Gerry Adams before the 1994 ceasefire, and pledged to fund Sinn Fein’s Washington office once the ceasefire was in place. His foundation has since funded cross community social projects in Northern Ireland.
He does not own any property any more, but lives in apartments rented for him by his foundation, and travels the world visiting projects funded by his foundation and seeking new opportunities to donate. Until his 76th birthday he always flew economy class, but his foundation, he told Eamon Dunphy, has in the past year passed a resolution instructing him to travel business class, for health reasons.
At 76, he has said he intends to donate the remainder of the money, another four billion dollars approximately, over the next ten years.
Notoriously publicity-shy, Mr Feeney has until recently managed to do much of his work anonymously, but agreed to participate in a biography by Conor O’Clery last year, The Billionaire Who Wasn’t – How Chuck Feeney Made and Gave Away a Fortune, because he wanted to promote the idea of ‘giving while living’.
Asked by Eamon Dunphy if he had a message for the “nouveaux riches” of Ireland, he said:
“As you know I’ve been relatively unwilling to tell people what they should do… but I guess my attitude today is “try it, you’ll like it.” Secondly, giving while living has got to be better than giving while dead.”
Tune into Conversations with Eamon Dunphy, Saturday, 9.10am on RTÉ Radio 1
Download Conversations with Eamon Dunphy from www.rte.ie/radio1/eamondunphy
Date: Friday, 18 January 2008
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NOTES TO EDITOR:
• THE INTERVIEW WILL BE BROADCAST AT 9.10AM ON RTÉ RADIO 1.
• THERE ARE NO ADVANCE COPIES OF THE PROGRAMME AVAILABLE.
• THE PROGRAMME WILL BE AVAILABLE AS A PODCAST AND/OR MP3 DOWNLOAD FROM: www.rte.ie/radio1/eamondunphy/ WITHIN 15 MINUTES OF BROADCAST.
Further Information from RTÉ Radio Press Office:
Sandra Byrne, (01) 208 2506/ 087 249 3048, sandra.byrne@rte.ie
Denise Sammon, (01) 208 2215, denise.sammmon@rte.ie