According to the Irish Independent and The Irish Examiner, 70-year-old Irish businessman Jim Mansfield, one of Ireland’s most unorthodox property tycoons, unveiled on Sunday details of a project on the site of his Citywest Hotel complex which will, allegedly, receive the first 750 pre-university Saudi students, 600 males and 150 females, this April.
Mansfield Group CEO Sean Whelan said they had signed their first contract with the Ministry of Higher Education, an allegation a source at the ministry denied any knowledge of. An official at the Saudi Embassy in Dublin also confirmed “the Embassy has no knowledge of such an agreement.”
Wheelan is reported talking of a contract worth €250 million and for an “initial” six-and-a-half years and that all Saudi students would be funded by the King Abdullah Scholarship Program.
Exactly who these “Saudis” are is a mystery — certainly not the Saudi Embassy in Dublin or the Ministry of Higher Education who say they know nothing about the supposed contract.
Arab News spoke to Wheelan’s secretary on Monday but nobody was available for comment.
The college is more of a dream than a reality — a dream to transform a failing Citywest retail complex into a successful education venture: the Citywest Institute of Education. The company has submitted a change-of-use planning application to the local authority, the South Dublin County Council, based on the claim that a contract with Saudi Arabia has been agreed. A decision is, however, not due until March 7.
On the other hand, a spokesperson for the Irish Department of Education said it was “not involved in bringing this project here,” adding that it goes against the policy of the Irish government which stresses that foreign students should integrate into the community.
In response to fears that this will be an “Islamic university,” The Citywest Institute said students will be taught about Irish and European culture. The college will be based in an unused golf and shopping village that never quite took off. Jim Mansfield, the man behind the scheme, is a controversial property tycoon with a colourful reputation. Four years ago, a plane he owned, due to fly to his own private aerodrome outside Dublin, was held in Belgium after police found $7million worth of heroin on board. Mansfield claimed to know nothing about the drugs. He also claimed that his aerodrome was one of the most secure in Ireland.
