[Fsfe-ie] Abusive caller to Proinsias De Rossa MEP

[James Heald]

Fwd'ing this I've just seen from an FFII person in Brussels.


Personal contacts with MEPs are *vital*, if we're to win the vote ahead.

We mustn't let idiots like this poison them.




-------- Original Message --------

I just got a phone call (from an Irish number) from a very agitated
assistant of Proinsias De Rossa MEP. He got a phone call from an Irish
person who was threatening him and being very intimidating. The
assistant was clearly very shocked by that call and very agitated
(talking extremely fast, it was hard to follow at times).

He repeated over and over again that

a) this was not the way to get support in the EP (of course)
b) De Rossa is not even responsible for this dossier
c) that the person who called didn't really know anything about the
situation, and that De Rossa actually supports the position of the EP
from 2003 (he seemed to indicate that De Rossa supported it back then
already, but I can't find his voting records... Nevertheless, there's
this: http://www.derossa.com/asp/showdoc.asp?AREA=3&ID=522)
d) that he really didn't accept of being intimidated like this

I'm not sure what he expected from me, but I guess he simply had to
find someone to talk to about this. I of course told this kind of
behaviour is inacceptable, that we condemn this kind of actions etc. In
the end, he seemed to calm down a bit, and I directed him to to the
IFSO's website for possibly contacting someone from Ireland related to
the anti-software patents fight.

Anyway, it is not unthinkable that this person is also calling other
Irish MEPs, but I doubt many more will contact us about it. I don't
know how to react to this kind of things, or how to prevent (reduce) it
though.