President Michael D Higgins is to return to his home in Rahoon, Galway when he leaves Áras an Uachtaráin in November, where he plans to continue working on food security, while writing poems and resuming unfinished books.
“Food security, and the achievement of food security, are themes which I am anxious to continue working on after I complete my term as President of Ireland in a few weeks’ time,” he told a video address to the World Food Forum this month.
At 84, Higgins is significantly older than the last two presidents when they left office, taking up roles in academia and in international organisations. However, there will be opportunities for him if he wishes, including writing books.
“People want me to do things but I have taken no advances. I’m still hoping to be a bit free,” he said in a recent interview.
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He has spoken of returning to old projects and of spending time with his grandchildren, Finn (2) and Fiadh (5), in recent interviews.
“I’ve got all these books ... left aside to come back to, so I won’t be stuck for something to do,” he said recently on RTÉ Radio 1.
The move of Higgins and his wife Sabina from Áras an Uachtaráin to Galway is set to be a logistical challenge, involving many boxes and documents as well as the transport of their four-year-old Bernese mountain dog Misneach, who grew up in the official residence.
He said in an interview with the Times newspaper that he will continue writing poetry, having published several volumes, though he has some physical constraints.
“I have arthritis and I can’t stay at the kitchen table for as long as I did before, but I’ll manage. I intend to write a poem, for example, for a young journalist who was murdered in Gaza,” he told the newspaper.
Higgins suffered a stroke last year and has said he needs to be “careful about his balance” as it has affected his left ankle.
Sabina has said she expects her husband to remain in demand. “People will be coming for him,” she told RTÉ.
She added that she was looking forward to “heading home to Galway” and a slower pace of life after leaving the Áras.
I will be “looking up at beautiful western sunsets and I will not have a bother in the world about what is happening,” she said, adding that she would return to books that she has not “had a chance” to read.
The former president will not be short of financial means. He is entitled to a pension of half his final presidential salary, which is currently about €350,000 a year.
He is also entitled to a pension from his time in the Oireachtas and as a former government minister, which he waived during his time in office.
Combined, this is about €100,000 a year. Throughout his presidential term he continued to draw a pension accrued from his time as a university lecturer, which was €19,000 a year in 2018. In total, he will be entitled to at least €294,000 a year in pensions. He has not said whether he intends to waive any as he has in the past.
A spokesman for the president said that because Higgins took a reduced salary for part of his time in office, and also waived his ministerial pension while in office, he had “voluntarily gifted a total of €2 million to the State over his two terms in office”.
Higgins’ predecessor as president Mary McAleese was 60 when she left office and went on to become Professor of Children, Law & Religion at University of Glasgow and the Chancellor of Trinity College Dublin.
Mary Robinson became the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights when she left office at age 53, and subsequently held a range of international roles including with The Elders, an international human rights organisation founded by Nelson Mandela.
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