Lessons in hope for Ireland

What a wonderfully uplifting good news story the world witnessed last week with the rescue of the 33 miners from the bowels of the earth beneath the Atacama Desert in northern Chile. When the main shaft in the San José copper and gold mine mine collapsed and was blocked by a massive rockfall in early August, trapping the men over 2,000 feet down with no way to escape, the story seemed to follow the predictable pattern of other mining disasters in far-flung places. Scant attention was paid to it, apart from perhaps a fleeting pang of sympathy for the entombed group who were already presumed dead. All that changed, however, three weeks later when the Chilean president stunned his nation and the wider world with the news that the men were alive and in relatively good health. There followed a challenging, complex and time-consuming rescue operation that would last a further 40 days to get the men to the surface, all the while keeping them alive and sane through a borehole lifeline which brought them food, water and communications. For those on the surface, the rescue operation was a feat of engineering, politics and co-operation at a number of levels; for the men buried 2,300 feet beneath the earth, it was a much bigger feat of instilling calm and discipline that kept all 33 alive while they awaited rescue. A country almost exclusively associated in the past with Pincohet, jackboot fascism, death squads and a bitter legacy of political repression has, as a result of this one dramatic incident, found itself rehabilitated in the eyes of the world thanks to the power of rolling 24-hour news which kept a breathless global audience up to speed with a blow-by-blow account of the daring rescue effort. It is estimated that one in five of the world’s population watched some part of the operation live as the men were hoisted to the surface over a period of less than 24 hours. What started out as a probable tragedy ended with a miracle. In many ways, we in Ireland can equate the dark place in which we have found ourselves economically with 'el refugio’, where the 33 Chilean miners were holed up for the first three weeks of their nightmare, not knowing whether they would live or die, before a drill pierced their chamber. We can also take cues from how this group of ordinary men organised themselves and began to prepare for their eventual rescue once they knew the worst was behind them. And there are lessons, too, for our political leadership. The boundless negativity that pervades media discussion on the economic hole in Ireland’s fiscal balance sheet needs to be counter-balanced by some badly-needed positivity, even if it is difficult to find these days. The absence of hope can only mean despair, and this country cannot allow itself to wallow in any kind of self-pity while a way is charted out of the difficult circumstances brought about by the mismanagement of the Irish economy, the bursting of the property bubble and the banking bust. Some sections of the Irish media appear to have an insatiable appetite for self-destructive pessimism. Constantly, we are being fed a diet of woe, hopelessness and recrimination. The time for those who have done wrong to atone will come, but we must prioritise that which needs fixing first. Economies are built on hope and hard work - just like Germany in 1945 - and Ireland can rise again before long if those charged with leading our country could take a leaf from the book of President Sebastian Pinera and Chilean mining minister Laurence Golborne. They matched their calm and reassuring words by engineering a great escape and turned a crisis into a triumph for their country. Instead of the miserable diet of doom and gloom we have grown accustomed to each day, our political leaders from all sides, and our media, needs to instill a sense of confidence in our people that we will get through this difficult period in our history and emerge stronger on the other side. Yes, the problems the country faces are very considerable and there will be pain to be shared by all, but imagination, determination, faith and hope can often overcome what initially seems unsurmountable. Let our leaders take their cues from the Chilean leadership and start instilling the kind of spirit of selfless solidarity which, one week ago, saw despair give way to hope and finally elation.