Swiss monitor to check records of Manuela Riedo rape charity

THE SWISS organisation which monitors charities is to investigate the financial affairs of the Manuela Riedo Foundation.

The Swiss Federal Supervisory Board for Foundations, Eidgenössische Stiftungsaufsicht (ESA), said it would intervene following reports in the Swiss press that money was unaccounted for.

The Basle-based Irish publican Brendan McGuinness, who set up the foundation to support victims of rape last summer in honour of the teenager who was murdered in Galway in October 2007, said he was going to stand down because of a breakdown in trust between himself and Manuela Riedo’s mother, Arlette.

The differences between them originally arose out of a decision by Ms Riedo to give her approval for a concert in Galway last October at a time when he was organising one in the O2 in Dublin.

Katja Zürcher, a spokeswoman for the Swiss charities monitoring organisation, ESA, said they were not conducting any kind of formal investigation, but trying to resolve contradictory statements about money that was supposed to be in the accounts of the foundation.

Mr McGuinness said he would hand over about €11,000 he raised for the foundation from a concert in his pub last July once his bookkeeper had deducted expenses from it.

Meanwhile, Swiss brewery Feldschlösschen said CHF230,000 (€190,000) of sponsorship for the foundation over a planned concert in Bern’s National Stadium was not paid over because the concert did not go ahead. Mr McGuinness said he was happy to show the books of the foundation to anybody who wanted to see them.

The organisers of a fundraising concert in Galway say they have not transferred €50,000 collected to the foundation in Switzerland at the request of Manuela’s parents, Hans-Pieter and Arlette, who have asked that the money be kept in Ireland for Irish causes. Galway concert organiser Shane Lennon said they were willing to transfer the funds to Switzerland if this was the wish of the family.