An Phoblacht May 2014

ap032-001.qxd

23/04/2014

10:04

Page 2

WHAT’S AFTER The big picture Artist Kevin Sharkey WINDSOR made music with CASTLE? Bob Geldof and was Declan Kearney on Martin McGuinness’s ‘Mandela Moment’

Kirsty McColl’s cleaner – now he’s joined Sinn Féin

Valley of the Squinting Windows Rural Ireland in modern literature as read by Robert Allen

anphoblacht

Sraith Nua Iml 37 Uimhir 5

May / Bealtaine 2014

PRICE €2/£2

STAND UP AND BE COUNTED

VOTE SINN

FÉIN

ap002-003.qxd

23/04/2014

10:05

Page 1

2 May / Bealtaine 2014

anphoblacht

www.anphoblacht.com

IN PICTURES

photos@anphoblacht.com

WHAT’S INSIDE 4&5 Martin McGuinness, Windsor Castle and President Higgins’s state visit to Britain 8 Beidh ‘raic’ ar na cladaigh ma dhéantar priobháidiú ar chearta bainte feamainne 10 & 11 Political posters, papers and prints – National Print Museum exhibition

12 & 13 From Thomas Davis to Bobby Sands and Nelson Mandela – Political education in revolutionary struggles

5 Republican former POWs Jimmy Torney, Robert ‘Goose’ Russell and Derryman Eddie Harkin at the recently-painted mural dedicated to Che Guevara on the Falls Road

14 Vincent Browne and the Establishment media offensive against Sinn Féin 15 Bik McFarlane in Switzerland at 1981 Hunger Strike event

5 Cllr Tierna Cunningham and members of the Mairéad Farrell Republican Youth Committee canvass in Belfast

5 Mary Lou McDonald TD at the 100th anniversary of the foundation of Cumann na mBan in Dublin’s Wynn's Hotel

18 & 19 Sinn Féin backs Foras na Gaeilge proposals for the Irish language 20 & 21 Book reviews: The real life and times of the heroes of 1916 22 & 23 Commemorations and history – Dr Johnston McMaster of the Ethical and Shared Remembering Project 24 Spain must embrace ETA weapons initiative, says Jim Gibney 30 GAA: Cynical fouling and the black card 21 Matt Treacy on Brazil’s World Cup woes

5 Thousands rally outside Leinster House in opposition to placing industrial wind farms and electricity pylons close to rural communities

ap002-003.qxd

23/04/2014

10:06

Page 2

www.anphoblacht.com

May / Bealtaine 2014 3

EASTER RISING COMMEMORATIONS 2014

Republicans stand up for equality, human rights and social justice for all PHOTO: CHARLIE GIBLIN

AFTER taking part with President Michael D. Higgins and Irish Government ministers in the Irish state commemoration of the 1916 Easter Rising in Dublin on Easter Sunday morning, joint First Minister Martin McGuinness was the main speaker at the Easter commemoration in Monaghan town. The Sinn Féin leader said that “shared hurts need to be acknowledged, lessened and, if possible, healed”.

As part of a wide-ranging speech, Martin McGuinness said: “Republicans are committed to a genuine process of national reconciliation and this means reaching

DONEGAL

ARMAGH

5 The Easter Rising commemoration in Cockhill Cemetery

5 A wreath is laid at the Camlough Easter Rising commemoration

‘Republicans have shown in words and deeds that we are absolutely committed to this process of reconciliation. But unionists must also participate in this process. They need to reach out to republicans’ out to the unionist community in a spirit of generosity and understanding.

“Earlier this month, a confident and united Sinn Féin leadership decided that republican representatives, including myself, should participate fully in the Irish President’s state visit to Britain. Our party leadership took this decision in the context of republican objectives and as an initiative to further strengthen the process of change and reconciliation.

“Republicans have shown in words and deeds that we are absolutely committed to this process of reconciliation. But unionists must also participate in this process. They need to reach out to republicans. The conflict was long and bitter. Many people were hurt on all sides. No one has a monopoly on suffering. It is time to begin discussing how shared hurts can be acknowledged, lessened and, if possible, healed.

“Republicans fully acknowledge the hurt that we inflicted in the course of the conflict. Unionists also need to recognise the hurt they have created. They need to turn their backs on the inequality and repression that marked 50 years of one-party rule in the north. They need to challenge rejectionist unionists. They need to show positive leadership.”

Speaking at the Easter commemoration in Belfast organised by the

DUBLIN 5 Hundreds of people march behind a banner dedicated to Cumann na mBan at the Dublin Easter commemoration on O’Connell Street

WICKLOW

GALWAY 5 Cllr Dermot Connelly at the Ballinasloe Easter commemoration National Graves Association, Sinn Féin MEP Martina Anderson said that the DUP should remember they were not elected to be messenger boys for the millionaires in David Cameron’s Cabinet in London imposing “savage cuts to public funding and welfare”.

British Tory policy threatens to destroy the economy in the North, she said.

“If it had not been for Sinn Féin,” Martina Anderson pointed out, “the DUP’s Nelson McCausland was quite prepared to implement the dictates of Cameron’s millionaire Cabinet in Westminster years ago without any change.

Sinn Féin is not opposed to sensi-

5 The Rising Phoenix Republican Flute Band in Bray

5 Martina Anderson MEP in Belfast

ble welfare reforms, she said.

“We are opposed to the agenda which seeks to make the most vulnerable and ordinary working families pay for the greed and excesses of the bankers.

“This should come as no surprise to the DUP. “We have been crystal clear on this. We have voted against the Bill at every stage in the Assembly.

“The DUP on the Executive need to start behaving like ministers for the people.

“Sinn Féin is politically and ideologically opposed to the politics of austerity North, South and in Europe.

“The DUP need to recognise that

republicans stand up for equality, human rights and social justice for all – and that is a reality they need to get used to.”

At a republican commemoration in Newry to mark the 1916 Easter Rising, Sinn Féin MLA Gerry Kelly appealed to the loyal orders to step up to the mark and enter into a new phase of reconciliation.

The North Belfast MLA said: “The loyal orders have not stepped up to the mark in trying to move past conflict and into a new phase of reconciliation,” he said.

Unfortunately, the intransigence of hardline fringe unionist elements is

‘Unionists also need to recognise the hurt they have created.

They need to turn their backs on the inequality and repression that marked 50 years of one-party rule in the North. They need to show positive leadership’ not just tolerated but encouraged by unionist politicians, the north Belfast MLA said.

“A small start would be for unionist politicians themselves to show a little respect. I appeal to the various loyal orders to get into meaningful dialogue with residents. All resolutions start with meaningful dialogue.”

The Sinn Féin MLA accused the small minority of republican socalled ‘dissidents’ of waging war on the nationalist community and having an agenda of derailing any progress in policing, in the Peace Process and the political process.

“They have an agenda of a return to a conflict,” he said, accusing them of being heavily involved in criminality.

“To date, the biggest percentage of any killings carried out by these dissidents have been in internal feuds.

“This is not a struggle for Irish freedom. If they are at war it is with each other and the nationalist community.

“Groups with no popular support, no public face and no strategy for the achievement of republican objectives are now merely killing people for the sake of killing.”

SEE PAGE 15

Gerry Adams unveils plans for 1916 Revolutionary Quarter

ap004-005.qxd

23/04/2014

10:07

Page 1

4 May / Bealtaine 2014

CONTACT

www.anphoblacht.com

IRISH PRESIDENT’S STATE VISIT TO BRITAIN AND SINN FÉIN’S PARTICIPATION

NEWS newsdesk@anphoblacht.com NOTICES notices@anphoblacht.com PHOTOS photos@anphoblacht.com HAVE YOU SUBSCRIBED TO AN PHOBLACHT ONLINE? SUBSCRIBE ONLINE to get your An Phoblacht delivered direct to your mobile device or computer for just €10 per 12 issues and access to An Phoblacht’s historic archives You also get IRIS the republican magazine FREE

www.anphoblacht.com AN PHOBLACHT is published monthly by Sinn Féin.

The views in An Phoblacht are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of Sinn Féin.

We welcome articles, opinions and photographs from new contributors but please contact the Editor first.

AN PHOBLACHT www.anphoblacht.com Kevin Barry House 44 Parnell Square, Dublin 1, Ireland Telephone: (+353 1) 872 6 100 Email: editor@anphoblacht.com Layout: production@anphoblacht.com – Mark Dawson

A challenge for Irish republicans, a gesture of respect to unionists

BY MARGARET SKINNIDER CUMANN NA mBAN AND IRISH CITIZEN ARMY VOLUNTEER

First-hand account of Margaret’s active role prior to and after the 1916 Rising, including her inside story from the Republican garrison in the College of Surgeons on St Stephen's Green.

Margaret, who was the only female Volunteer wounded during the Rising, played a very active role for years after in the struggle for Irish freedom.

This book has Margaret's original text with photographs to compliment her narrative and a comprehensive introduction by historian Aengus Ó Snodaigh TD

Price €9.99 Plus p+p From: Sinn Féin Bookshop, 58 Parnell Square, Dublin 1.

Tel: (+353 1) 814 8542 Email: sales@sinnfeinbookshop.com

THE presence of Sinn Féin’s Martin McGuinness at the state visit of the President of Ireland to Britain in April was a a “significant political and symbolic challenge” for Irish republicans, Martin McGuinness acknowledged, but he added: “My presence alongside Peter Robinson brings an all-island dimension to this historic event which, it is worth noting, has taken 93 years to happen.”

The first official state visit from the President of Ireland to Britain saw political leaders from across Ireland attend a number of events at the home of Britain’s Queen Elizabeth in Windsor Castle. As well as politicians, over 160 guests from Irish cultural and sporting life (including international rugby star Brian O’Driscoll and his actress wife Amy Huberman, Oscar-winning actor Daniel Day-Lewis, and Eurovision winner Eimear Quinn) took part. Thousands also attended a celebration of Irish music, dance and poetry at the Royal Albert Hall.

Speaking in advance of the visit, Sinn Féin President Gerry Adams TD told reporters: “This decision by a confident republican leadership is in keeping with the transition that is ongoing within the island of Ireland and between Ireland, including the North, and Britain.”

Ahead of the meeting, former Conservative Party Chair Norman Tebbit

BY MARK MOLONEY expressed his hope that Martin McGuinness would be murdered by the so-called ‘Real IRA’ for taking part in the event. (Lord Tebbit and his wife were injured in the IRA attack on the British Conservative Party conference at the Grand Hotel in Brighton in 1984.)

Responding to the comments, Gerry Adams said that while he understands that Norman Tebbit is a victim of the conflict, for him to advocate the assassination of joint First Minister Martin McGuinness “is a shocking throwback to a violent past from which we are seeking to move on. The state visit is another important milestone in doing that.”

Sinn Féin National Chairpreson Declan Kearney said the presence of Sinn Féin at the state visit was a symbolic gesture of reconciliation to unionists and a demonstration of the party’s commitment to mutual respect and parity of esteem.

Declan Kearney also noted that it would have been easier for Sinn Féin to have done nothing and not taken part in the event (see his analysis opposite), saying that “initiatives and gestures can also be risky. They often involve making uncomfortable decisions when the safe thing might be to do nothing.

“Sinn Féin believed that going to Windsor Castle could represent a symbolic demonstration of our unambiguous commitment to mutual respect and parity of esteem; and a sincere gesture of reconciliation and respect towards our unionist neighbours.”

Reverend Harold Good, former President of the Methodist Church of Ireland, welcomed the visit, saying it is a “further sign of how much things have changed and moved on”.

The Methodist Church leader added: “Obviously, this was a challenging decision for Irish republicanism. But the positive way in which their acceptance of this invitation has been welcomed across the community is a further example of how such gestures can have a positive affect upon attitudes, perception and relationships.”

These sentiments were echoed by Derry Presbyterian Minister Reverend David Latimer, who described Martin McGuinness’s meeting with Queen Elizabeth as “timely” and “momentous” adding that it “has the potential to be transformational”.

“Two very different people deciding to ‘Walk the Walk’ is remarkable by any standards. Somewhere out at the edges, the night is turning, which should incentivise us to do what deep in our hearts we know needs to be done, and that’s to keep moving forward together.”

ap004-005.qxd

23/04/2014

10:07

Page 2

www.anphoblacht.com

May / Bealtaine 2014 5

DECLAN

KEARNEY

SINN FÉIN NATIONAL CHAIRPERSON

Urgent political action required following Windsor Castle gestures CHANGE is happening all over Ireland because of the Irish Peace Process. The nature of that change has different dynamics North and South and is now impacting upon the historic colonial relationship between Britain and Ireland. And this is happening against the backdrop of our conflict resolution process.

Sinn Féin’s leadership gave deep consideration to whether and in what way the party should participate in the Irish President’s state visit to Britain.

The deepening Northern political impasse, fuelled by this British government’s bad faith and negative, one-sided political strategy; the veto being exercised over political progress by the DUP and UUP unionist parties’ intransigence; and the activities of unionist and Orange extremists all weighed heavily on our discussions.

Those combined difficulties challenge the viability of power-sharing and discredit the political process.

Republicans had to assess whether our participation (and especially attendance at the state banquet and reception in Windsor Castle) would

‘Mandela Moments’ – initiatives and gestures – can also be risky because they often involve making uncomfortable decisions when the safe thing might be to do nothing

be a mistake in such circumstances, or could potentially make a contribution towards restoring political stability and serve as an initiative to strengthen the pursuit of reconciliation and healing.

Ireland’s journey from political conflict remains incomplete. It has been a slow process. Significantly, Queen Elizabeth acknowledged the one-thousand-year-old legacy of shared conflict between Ireland and Britain.

Since the Peace Process began, many challenges have had to be faced. Peace has had to be encouraged, consolidat-

5 Joint First Minister Martin McGuinness MLA meets Queen Elizabeth at Windsor Castle ed and sustained throughout by important symbolic initiatives. These have been essential to avoid stalemate and keep forward momentum.

They can be described as ‘Mandela moments’.

Martin McGuinness’s meeting with Queen Elizabeth in 2012 was such a moment.

But initiatives and gestures can also be risky because they often involve making uncomfortable decisions when the safe thing might be to do nothing.

That was one option available to the Sinn Féin leadership. It would certainly have involved much less of a challenge for republican activists, the families of our patriot dead, and victims and survivors of unionist and state forces.

However, a confident and cohesive Sinn Féin leadership decided, in context with republican objectives and our party’s peace strategy, that an initiative was required at this time.

Our view was that standing still in the face of all the efforts to damage the political process was not a viable option. Inertia is the enemy of the Peace Process.

We concluded that acceptance

That potential must not now be squandered.

To do otherwise will play directly into the hands of those opposed to progress.

The British and Irish governments have a huge opportunity and responsibility to build upon the initiatives and risks taken during the President of Ireland’s visit.

The US Government remains a very significant influence. Commitments made by both governments over the last 16 years need to be honoured.

The failure to implement Acht na Gaeilge and the Bill of Rights typify unfulfilled guarantees.

Continuing negative political interventions by this British Government and particularly the two most recent speeches from Theresa Villiers are causing real damage to the peace and political processes. Her public derogation from the Weston Park Agreement, rejection of the reality that multiple narratives of our conflict exist, and contempt for the suffering of republican and nationalist victims and survivors, clearly demonstrate that she and those charged with overseeing British Government policy on Ireland have no

Inertia is the enemy of the Peace Process

5 Queen Elizabeth lays a wreath at the Garden of Remembrance to those who fought for Irish freedom of all invitations to participate in the state visit, including the engagements hosted by Queen Elizabeth, was the right decision and would show that the process of change is continuing despite those who want to frustrate its progress.

Sinn Féin believed that going to Windsor Castle could represent a symbolic demonstration of our unambiguous commitment to mutual respect and parity of esteem and a sincere gesture of reconciliation and respect towards our unionist neighbours. It was also an acknowledgement that the historic conflict between Britain and Ireland must be resolved These events have the potential to advance the process of change in our society, in improving relations between Ireland and Britain, and towards the development of reconciliation. It is work which all sides have a responsibility to take forward.

3 Nelson Mandela is cheered on by 65,000 mainly white fans during the 1995 Rugby World Cup final in South Africa

regard for the process of conflict resolution. They have now become a big part of the problem.

However, ingrained sectarian hostility also has a toxic influence in Northern politics which directly thwarts the institutions’ ability to deliver change: unionist blocking of the Education and Skills Authority and the Long Kesh site project are glaring examples.

It is time to get real about managing change in the Northern Executive. A political strategy is required to avoid a vacuum opening up, and to introduce new political momentum.

Endorsement of the Haass compromises is central to that.

Commitment by all parties and governments to real power sharing is paramount. Partnership government must be properly embraced. The sectarian bigots and political extremists need to be shunned by every section of this community.

That should be given public expression by all leaders in society. For some, this will mean having to leave their comfort zones.

The symbolic gestures of reconciliation and respect at Windsor Castle need to speedily translate into urgent political action.

There is only one future and that is a new phase of the Peace Process which delivers reconciliation, healing, a shared future, and economic recovery and prosperity for everyone.

ap006-007.qxd

23/04/2014

10:09

Page 1

6 May / Bealtaine 2014

www.anphoblacht.com

‘Putting Ireland First’ isn’t just a slogan – it’s a statement of intent, says Mary Lou McDonald about May’s elections, North and South

STAND UP AND BE COUNTED

GET OUT AND VOTE

IT’S EARLY on Monday and Mary Lou’s constituency staff are preparing to open her advice centre on Dublin’s North Strand, the continuation of the road running from Connolly Station in Amiens Street towards Fairview Park. Already there is a queue of people waiting, seeking help with issues ranging from housing, healthcare and social welfare payments.

I sit down with the Dublin Central TD and possibly the most formidable member to have sat on the Oireachtas’s Public Accounts Committee (Mary Lou laughs when I suggest she is ‘feared’).

We are in an office adorned with photos of Constance Markievicz, the 1981 Hunger Strikers and Volunteer Máiread Farrell.

Mary Lou says her first message to the public is obvious but needs to be said: “Get out and vote!”

She’s very aware that in the last few months people may be disillusioned with politics and politicans, she tells me.

“They see a lot of backslapping and cronyism in the Establishment and certain political parties, but the only way to change that is to use your vote.

“Sinn Féin is the only party, I believe, that has the political will to really challenge the system and I think you see that in our work in the Dáil, the Executive, the Assembly and local authorities – that Sinn Féin representatives are not afraid to stand up and be counted, and to advocate on behalf of our communities and in the interests of Ireland without fear or favour. But we can only be as effective as the support we have on the ground.”

On the doors in her constituency, it is issues such as Property Tax, Water charges, social welfare cuts, lack of jobs and healthcare that are still the big issues.

“Despite all the Government propaganda from Fine Gael and Labour, there is still a major problem about unemployment, emigration is at a historic high, and we have a general neglect of communities. We need investment, we need confidence and to build a politics of hope. Our stance is identifying and challenging those things that are wrong in the current system and offering an alternative,” she says.

For the first time, Sinn Féin will field candidates in every single local electoral ward in Ireland. No other party has ever done that.

“Every county, every community will have the opportunity to back a Sinn Féin candidate,” Mary Lou says with a smile of satisfaction. “And while

AS European and local elections take place in May across Ireland, North and South, An Phoblacht’s MARK MOLONEY spoke to Sinn Féin deputy leader MARY LOU McDONALD TD at her constituency office in Dublin’s north inner city to talk about candidates, opinion polls and the hectic final run-in to polling day.

that’s an achievement for us as a political party, it will be a real positive for communities if – and only if – people come out and vote.”

Mary Lou makes particular mention of sitting councillors and new candidates going up for election, the ones who toil away like their counterparts in the Oireachtas, the Assembly or the European Parliament but often go unrecognised.

“For all those candidates running for the first time, I want to commend them. It’s a big deal and it takes courage. It’s a big ask on an individual and their family so I just want to congratulate all those women and men who have come forward in record numbers to be Sinn Féin candidates.

And, of course, to their support teams who help get them elected and provide the back-up in the offices and communities they represent. You can feel the camaraderie between our people at election time and it brings out the best in Sinn Féin activists.”

I ask her about the growth of Sinn Féin in the South of Ireland.

Recent opinion polls placed the party at almost twice what it received in the local and

‘Sinn Féin is the only party that has the political will to really challenge the system and I think you see that in our work in the Dáil, the Executive, the Assembly and local authorities. But we can only be as effective as the support we have on the ground’

European elections of 2009. Mary Lou says she recognises that the Dáil general election breakthrough of 2011 and subsequent impressive performances from Sinn Féin TDs and senators have been a factor. But it’s much more than that, she says.

“I don’t think it’s down to individuals. It’s very much a team effort. Having said that, we have huge individual talents within our team. For every TD, MLA or senator you see, there are plenty of others coming up the line.”

“Since our team entered the Oireachtas, the trends have been consistently positive.

Under Gerry Adams’s leadership our entire team has made a big impact in the Dáil. Year on year we have presented an alternative costed Budget, so when the Government cries crocodile tears and claims they have no other option but these cuts, we’ve shown them very plainly what the options are, what they cost and how to manage a sustainable recovery in a way that doesn’t heap more pain on working people and families.”

It’s this practical work in demonstrating an

alternative that Mary Lou believes is bringing people around to the Sinn Féin message.

And what of the batch of recent polls predicting big things for the party?

“Everyone who knows me knows I am virtually allergic to opinion polls,” she laughs, “but to coin a cliché: the only poll that actually matters in terms of changing politics and changing the quality of people’s lives will be in May, so there is no time for complacency.”

She says it is absolutely vital that people who want change keep the momentum going on the ground, especially people who are already Sinn Féin activists and supporters.

“We have the people, we have the politics, we have the heart for it. We need to have the stamina in the run-in to the elections and to keep it going until the last ballot is put into the last box.

Make sure we push ourselves that bit extra until we get to the finish line.”

We turn to the European elections.

Sinn Féin is standing a candidate in each of Ireland’s four constituencies: Marinta Anderson MEP in the Six Counties, Lynn Boylan in Dublin, Matt Carthy in the Midlands North West, and Liadh Ní Riada in the South constituency.

As a former Member of the European Parliament, Mary Lou says that returning an allIreland team to advocate for the country, defend Ireland’s interests and carry on the sterling work of Martina Anderson and her predecessor Bairbre de Brún is very important.

“People need to understand that a lot of the things that affect your daily life begin in Europe, including the austerity agenda,” Mary Lou stresses. “That thinking and notion of protecting banks, protecting developers and punishing citizens has its roots very much in the European system. And I believe the current crop of Irish MEPs (with the exception of Martina Anderson) have not challenged that agenda in any effective way.”

So what if Sinn Féin managed to return an MEP in every Irish constituency?

“They would still be four amidst 750, but it would represent a very strong team. That’s what marks out our politics – we are nationally organised. Our slogan might be ‘Putting Ireland First’ but it’s more than just a slogan: it’s a statement of intent from our representatives – whether they’re standing for a local council or aiming for Brussels.”

The fact that three of Sinn Féin’s four EU candidates are women, and that the party is standing an increased number of women candidates in the local elections, is something that has been remarked upon by many commentators. Mary Lou, as one of the people with responsibility for

‘Year on year we have presented an alternative costed Budget and shown Fine Gael and Labour very plainly what the options are and how to manage a sustainable recovery in a way that doesn’t heap more pain on working people and families’

ap006-007.qxd

23/04/2014

10:10

Page 2

www.anphoblacht.com

May / Bealtaine 2014 7

5 Sinn Féin is standing 350 candidates in local elections and is contesting all four EU constituencies

5 Driving the republican agenda, Jennifer McCann talks to An Phoblacht during a Belfast women’s canvass

5 Lynn Boylan, Matt Carthy, Martina Anderson and Liadh Ní Riada at the Sinn Féin candidate conference

5 Pearse Doherty TD , Dublin EU candidate Lynn Boylan, Midlands North West EU candidate Matt Carthy and Peadar Tóibín TD launch Sinn Féin’s ‘Real Investment, Real Jobs, Real Recovery’ document gender equality in the party, says it’s a case of a lot done, a lot more to do.

“We have made very significant progress. I am very happy to report that we will meet our 30% quota for women candidates; in some parts of

the country we will exceed that,” she tells me, “but we won’t be happy until we have perfect parity, in other words 50/50 between men and women.”

I put it to Mary Lou that many self-styled

‘experts’ in the mainstream media often trot out the line that ‘Sinn Féin is not ready for government’.

“That is rubbish,” she fires back. “We are in government in the North in a power-sharing executive with people [the DUP] whose politics are very, very different from ours. We have managed to make that work. It’s not perfect, it can be frustrating, but I think our party has shown very considerable political skill and maturity in how we have managed matters north of the Border.

“We stopped domestic water charges, we have stood up against Westminster’s attempts to force through welfare cuts similar to those that have ravaged the economy and people’s domestic lives in the South.”

She says commentary about not being ready or fit for Government should instead be aimed at the incumbent parties of Fine Gael and Labour.

“When you look at what the Labour Party promised before the last election, and see what they’re up to now, are you telling me they were fit or ready for government? I don’t believe they are fit to be in government.

“I don’t believe Fine Gael – with their slavish adherence to the policies of Fianna Fáil – are fit to be there. Did they show any real political conviction or courage?

No.” Mary Lou McDonald has a message for those who want to continually portray the idea of Sinn Féin in government, North and South, as something to be fearful of: “For those who wish to keep us in our box, or keep Sinn Féin on the margins, well we have news for them. They are not going to succeed. We are here, we are at the very centre of political life North and South, and we’re going to continue to make change.”

‘We need to have the stamina in the run-in to the elections and to keep it going until the last ballot is put into the last box. Make sure we push ourselves that bit extra until we get to the finish line’

ap008-009.qxd

23/04/2014

10:11

Page 1

8 May / Bealtaine 2014

www.anphoblacht.com

Le Trevor

Ó Clochartaigh

Beidh ‘raic’ ar na cladaigh ma dhéantar príobháidiú ar chearta bainte feamainne

‘SPITE’ FEAMAINNE Tá sean-ráiteas i ngaeilge – ‘spite feamainne’ - a bhaineann le troid idir bheirt sa gcás go dtéann duine amháin isteach le feamainn a bhaint ar ‘straidhp’ atá fágtha go traidisiúnta ag duine eile, nó ag a gclann. San aimsir a caitheadh, b’uafásach an choir le déanamh é, nach raibh glacadh ar bith ag an bpobal leis, arbh ionann é agus gadaíocht ó do chomharsan. Bheadh sé ar chomhchéim le colg an Bull McCabe i ndráma cáiliúil John B. Keane, ‘The Field’.

Sa lá atá inniú ann úsáidtear an nath cainte maidir le daoine a bhfuil achrann binibeach eatarthu. Agus aisteach go leor, sin a bheidh idir na pobail tuaithe agus an Rialtas má dhéantar príobháidiú ar chearta bainte feamainne na tíre.

Tá na cearta maidir le saothrú ón chladach leagtha síos san Acht Úrthrá 1933 agus achtanna a tháinig ina dhiaidh. Go bunúsach, is leis an Stát gach a bhfuil ar an gcladach munar féidir úinéireacht phríobáideach a chruthú agus más mian le duine ábhar a bhaint ón gcladach caithfear ceadúnas a fháil chuige sin. Le fírinne, ní dlí é sin a cuireadh i bhfeidhm riamh – go dtí anois - agus tá amhras ar phobail cois cósta gur nod don eolach atá anseo go bhfuil rud éigin eile ar bun ag an rialtas.

De réir fiosruithe atá déanta agam leis an Roinn Comhshaoil cuireadh litir chuig duine amháin le déanaí, atá ag baint fheamainne le fada, i gceantar a áirítear mar cheantar speisialta chaomhnaithe (SAC) ag rá go gcaithfeadh sé ceadúnas a bheith aige feasta ón Roinn chuige sin. Is cosúil gur bh’éigean don Roinn an litir a chur amach bunaithe ar ghearán a rinne Seirbhís na bPáirceanna Náisiúnta agus Fiadhúlra (NPWS) leo.

Ag an am céanna tá sé tugtha faoi deara go bhfuil iarratas déanta ag roinnt comhlachtai ar cheadúnais bainte feamainne ar stráicí fada d’ár gcósta, ó Thir Chonaill go Co. an Chláir. Ní shíleann na bainteoirí aonair gur comhtharlúint atá anseo, ach go bhfuil athrú ó bhonn dhá chur ar an gcaoi a fheidhmíonn tionscal na feamainne in Éirinn.

Ar cheann de na comhlachtai seo tá Arramara teo. atá lonnaithe i gConamara. Is comhlacht é seo atá 100% in úinéireacht stáit i láthair na h-uaire, faoi scáth Údarás na Gaeltachta. Ach, tá sé ar an margadh agus an idirbheartaiocht gar a bheith tugtha chuig ceann scríbe a mheastar, le comhlacht darb ainm ‘Acadian Seaplant’ as Ceanada. Tá córas bainistíochta cladaigh ag Acadian i gCeanada áit a bhfuil ceadúnas acu sin do bhaint na feamainne ar chladaigh Nova Scotia agus leagann siadsan amach cén áit, cén uair agus cé mhéid feamaine gur féidir le daoine baint.

Tá bainteoiri an Iarthar den tuairim go bhfuiltear ag iarraidh an córas céanna a chur i bhfeidhm anseo agus gurb shin an chúis a bhfuil Arramara teo. ag lorg ceadúnas bainte feamainne ó Bhéal a’Mhuirthead go Co. an Chláir. Tá tuairimaíocht ann go bhfuil seo mar bhunchoinníoll ag Acadian Seaplant sula gceannóidh siad Arramara ó Údaras na Gaeltachta agus ceaptar go bhfuil an margadh seo déanta agus Airí sa rialtas, chuig an leibhéal is airde b’fhéidir, tar éis an socrú seo a aontú eatarthu.

Is ionann seo agus príobháidiú na gcladaigh. Cruthaíonn sé monaplacht sa tionscal san Iarthar agus baineann sé an chumhacht idirbheartaíochta ó na bainteoirí féin agus tugtar an chumhacht ar fad don chomhlacht eachtrach. D’fhéadfadh sé tarlú go gcuirfí daoine isteach ar ‘straidhpeanna’ feamainne daoine eile nach bhfuil ag

Ní shileann na bainteoirí aonair gur comhtharlúint atá anseo, ach go bhfuil athru ó bhonn dhá chur ar an gcaoi a fheidhmíonn tionscal na feamainne in Éirinn. comhoibriú leis an gcomhlachtaagus go mbeidh sé ina chogadh dhearg ar na cladaigh dá bharr.

Sin an fáth a bhfuil na sluaite tagtha amach chuig cruinnithe i nGaillimh agus Muigh Eo agus iad ag moladh malairt leagan amach ina bhfágtar cumhacht i lamha na ndaoine maidir le leas a bhaint as an acmhainn nadúrtha seo.

Tá Sinn Féin ar son forbairt an tionscail, infheistiocht bhreise, ach cearta cothrom do na bainteoirí freisin. Táimid ag moladh comharchumann bainteoirí, nó a mhacasamhail, a dhéanfadh ionadaíocht orthu agus idirbheartaiocht leis na tairgeoirí chun cinntiú go mbíonn cothrom na féinne ag na h-oibrithe agus soláthar leanúnach bainistiochta do na comhlachtaí.

Ar deireadh, is cinneadh polaitiúil a bheidh ann, mar is é an tAire Comhshaoil a shocróidh cé a gheobhfaidh na ceadúnais. Beidh muid ag iarraidh ar an Aire tacú le múnla pobail a fhágfaidh smacht ag na bainteoiri ar a dtionscal féin. i gcomhair leis na comhlachtaí.

Muna ndéantar sin, is léir gur tuilleadh ‘spite’ feamainne a bheidh ann, dar linne.

ap008-009.qxd

23/04/2014

10:12

Page 2

www.anphoblacht.com

May / Bealtaine 2014 9

WEST TYRONE MP PAT DOHERTY LOOKS FOR LEADERSHIP IN THE WESTMINSTER PARTIES ON THE PEACE PROCESS PROGRESS

British Government facilitates unionist intransigence IT IS NOW several months since Richard Haass and Meghan O’Sullivan put forward their recommendations following their talks with the parties in the North. That period has seen an abject failure by the leadership of political unionism, blocking the proposals and, most recently, the cynical attempts to whip up a fake firestorm over the OTR (‘On the Runs’) issue as a smokescreen.

In Westminster, the British Government has gone along with this by its own inaction and failure to positively engage to ensure progress.

Successive parliamentary questions have seen British Secretary of State Theresa Villiers repeatedly pressed on what the Government is doing to move Haass forward. The response is always the same assertion that the Government is “fully engaged working with the parties”. Yet not once has the British Government indicated its support for Haass, allowing months to drag by, reneging on its responsibility to drive forward the Peace Process and its obligations to fulfil the Good Friday Agreement.

The British Government argues that it is essentially a matter for the parties to resolve their differences – a position which in not neutral but which supports the current unionist

intransigence. In effect, the British Government is engaged – not in driving forward the Peace Process but in allowing it to be blocked. British Government ministers are clearly able to move fast when it suits their agenda, like the speed with which the OTR inquiry was established, or their sense of purpose in attempting to impose their welfare cuts agenda.

The charge of Tory disengagement has been made for some time, not least from the British

needs to be clear that, in power, it would positively engage to take the Peace Process forward, in particular with a manifesto commitment to fulfil the outstanding issues of the Good Friday Agreement.

Secondly, Labour has to assert that, unlike the current government, it will not allow progress to

The British Labour Party needs to be clear it would take the Peace Process forward with a manifesto commitment to fulfil outstanding issues of the Good Friday Agreement

Not once has the British Tory/LibDem Government indicated its support for Haass/O’Sullivan Labour Party opposition. Labour, for its part, has said the Haass proposals “offer the basis for a positive way forward”. But as well as urging engagement, Labour should also spell out exactly what that engagement should be and what it would do were it to form the next government in 2015.

A celebrated legacy of the last British Labour Government was its role in achieving the Good Friday Agreement. Labour now

Sinn Féin’s Pat Doherty MP

be blocked by parties who are set against progressive change.

This is a winning policy which would not only benefit people in Britain and Ireland but would command strong support in the Irish electorate in Britain. This clear message is the leadership needed.

EASTER RISING ANNIVERSARY SEES GERRY ADAMS UNVEIL CHALLENGE TO IRISH GOVERNMENT

Sinn Féin plans for 1916 Revolutionary Quarter GERRY ADAMS was joined on Easter Sunday by relatives of some of those who fought and died during Easter Week 1916 to officially launch Sinn Féin’s proposals to establish a revolutionary quarter around the buildings and lanes of history where the last act in the drama of the 1916 Easter Week took place.

Speaking at the National Monument at 14-17 Moore Street just before Sinn Féin’s Easter Rising commemoration in Dublin, the republican leader said: “Sinn Féin is determined to ensure that 2016, the 1916 Centenary, is marked in the most appropriate way possible as a fitting, popular acknowledgement of the past but also – and just as importantly – as a pointer to a better future.”

He said the Irish Government’s amnesia about the revolutionary period is most evident in its plans for the Moore Street historic monument.

“The buildings on Moore Street, which were the last headquarters of the Provisional Government of the Irish Republic, have been left to fall into ruin. This is despite having been designated as a National Monument since 2007.

“In a sad metaphor of the state we live in, the buildings that sur-

5 Gerry Adams TD and the grandson of James Connolly, James Connolly-Heron, at the launch of the Sinn Féin document on Moore Street

vived British bombardment in 1916 now face destruction from property developers who plan to reduce it to rubble and build a shopping centre in its place.

“The potential threat to the National Monument under a current planning application is a matter of serious concern to Sinn Féin and many other citizens.

“I want to take this opportunity to officially launch, at this most appropriate venue and at this appropriate time, this document, The 1916 Revolutionary Quarter: A Vision for Dublin’s Historic Centre.”

He described the document as an “important set of proposals” published by Sinn Féin Átha Cliath and explained: “It is aimed at ensuring that the 1916 National Monument at Numbers 14 to 17 Moore Street is fully protected and preserved in its entirety as designated and that the surrounding buildings, streets and laneways are retained in such a manner that the potential to develop this area into a 1916 historic and cultural quarter can be fulfilled.

“Let us send a very clear message to the Government that it should ensure the full preservation of the national monument and to develop a plan to transform the GPO/Moore Street area into a historic quarter.”

ap010-011.qxd

23/04/2014

10:14

Page 1

10 May / Bealtaine 2014

www.anphoblacht.com

Political and

posters, papers prints

EXHIBITION

‘Irish Political Ephemera – What you maybe meant to keep’

RUNS TILL 27 MAY 2014 National Print Museum, Garrison Chapel, Beggar’s Bush Barracks, Haddington Road, Dublin 4

AS local and European elections loom, An Phoblacht’s MARK MOLONEY caught up with ALAN KINSELLA, whose exhibition of political literature from elections and referendums gone by is on display at the Dublin’s National Print Museum ALAN KINSELLA is busy rearranging stickers and badges in one of the display cases upstairs at the National Print Museum, located in the former Garrison Chapel in Beggar’s Bush, the former British military barracks in Dublin.

Running to almost 40 display panels and cabinets, the exhibition provides a fascinating visual history of elections, referendums and political campaigns in Ireland. Despite taking up the entire top floor of the building, Alan says it is just a tiny fraction of his overall archive: “Sorting out the pre-1970s stuff was okay,” he tells me as we walk past posters and flyers, “as I haven’t an awful lot from those periods.

But from then onwards it really was very difficult deciding what to include and what to leave out.

“It was also a matter of trying to choose the most even, balanced way of showing it and getting all the different parties and groupings in. It might be a political exhibition but I didn’t want to put my own political slant on it. I tried my best to be neutral,” Alan says with a smile.

With everything from the ‘big two’ of Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil all the way through to minor or defunct parties and groups such as the National Party, Ailtrí na hAiséirghe and the Socialist Labour Party, the exhibition certainly does have something for everyone.

Alan’s collecting days began outside a polling station in in Dún Laoghaire in February 1982.

“You were allowed to canvass outside them at that time. It was very busy, almost a carnival atmosphere. Barry Desmond of Labour was there and he handed me a card and signed it. I kept it, so that’s where it started. It

was a lot easier in those days. Also, as a lot of the leaflets arrived the morning of the election, you didn’t have to watch the post for weeks.”

Alan says a big change he’s noticed since those days is the strength of parties on the ground: “The larger parties certainly had a lot of people on the ground to deliver stuff door-todoor. On the morning of an election you would get a card in the letterbox from them saying ‘Don’t forget to vote for me’. Now a lot

‘Asking people, ‘Could you keep that election stuff for us when it comes through the door?’ I would’ve felt like a total weirdo’ of leafleting is contracted out to commercial companies, whereas parties used to have the people to do it themselves.”

We come to a leaflet by Fianna Fáil in 1982 slamming Fine Gael. Headline “So who was right?” it criticises Fine Gael for dismissing criticisms of their policies as “lies” — only for the party to go on and implement said ‘lies’.

“You don’t really see this kind of very negative stuff anymore,” says Alan . . . “well bar maybe against Sinn Féin,” he laughs. “Part of the reason is that by using negative campaiging you’re only getting attention for the person you’re attacking.”

Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, Fianna

Fáil and Fine Gael are able to produce stylish full-colour leaflets while others are left with black and white ones. “It just shows that the two big parties had money. The Labour stuff looks very cheap in comparison.”

Some issues never seem to change.

In the 1980s, parties are campaiging for the roll-out of telephones across the state; today it’s broadband. Crime is another constant issue.

“What you see consistently is parties attacking the Government over the levels of crime.

It’s the lowest common denominator,” Alan points out. “For example, Fianna Fáil can’t really make too big a deal about tax or other issues at the moment so they have to focus on other areas. You’ll see that strategy right up to the present and generally it happens when the economy is in good shape. It’s scaremongering almost but it’s easy to make political capital on it.”

Alan has managed to amass such a vast collection (stored in boxes and crates at his home) by writing to politicians, asking friends to hold on to leaflets, and, more recently, by people contacting him via the online archive: “Years ago I would have been very conscious about asking people, ‘Could you keep that election stuff for us when it comes through the door?’ I would’ve felt like a total weirdo,” he laughs. “But because I’ve been so vocal and well-known about it, it meant I got a lot of people in different areas willing to save literature for me.”

Some fantastic framed political posters adorn the walls. One of note is by the Irish Anti-War Movement advertising protests against US President George W. Bush’s visit to Ireland in 2004.

Also included in the exhibition is a collection of political newspapers and magazines from the award-winning Cedar Lounge

ap010-011.qxd

23/04/2014

10:14

Page 2

www.anphoblacht.com

May / Bealtaine 2014 11

5 Political badges, keyrings and other items on display at the National Print Museum

5 Left-wing publications from the Cedar Lounge Revolution are included in the exhibition

5 Alan Shatter’s bizarre ‘Star Trek’ themed leaflet

5 Party publications on display as part of the ‘Irish Political Ephemera – What you maybe meant to keep’ exhibition Revolution Irish political blog archive. It features left-wing publications including An Phoblacht, The United Irishman, Worker’s Republic, Class Struggle, Socialist Worker and many more.

I ask Alan has he any particular favourite leaflets. He takes me over to a selection of framed pieces above the display of badges and key-rings. “Read the first point on this one,” he says, pointing to an orange-tinted leaflet from John Burns of the Natural Law Party from the 1999 EU election in Dublin.

Some of the most interesting pieces in the collection come from referendum campaigns

Fantastic framed political posters adorn the walls Burns calls for NATO to stop their bombing campaign in Yugoslavia and for the immediate deployment of “7000 experts in Transcedental Meditation and Yogic flying to radiate peace in the region”. Burns came bottom of the poll with 1,006 votes and lost his deposit.

Others included are Alan Shatter’s bizarre leaflet comparing himself to William Shatner, complete with Shatter in Star Trek uniform.

Another favourite of Alan’s is joke candidate Bernie Murphy. The sandwichboard man was elected to Cork City Council in 1985 and ran for the Dáil two years later under the slogan: “A Legend in the Making”, causing uproar. His policies included a commitment to medical and dental care: “They have taken all our money, they can at least keep us alive,” he

city council caused huge losses to local betting shops.

Some of the most interesting pieces in the collection come from referendum campaigns.

While elections are confined to political parties and independents, referendums can bring out a host of different organisations, some often with very hardline views which they aren’t afraid to put to paper, particularly when it comes to divorce and abortion.

“One of my favourite pieces (although I don’t agree with it) is this Pro-Life Movement

said. He also called for gardaí to stop patrolling the Border and instead be redeployed on the streets: “Let Maggie mind it,” he declared in a nod towards British Prime Minister Thatcher.

Finally, he notes the odds of 50/1 being offered by local bookmakers against him taking a seat: “Get your money on Bernie and vote yourself the price of a holiday!” Many in the city did just that and his election to the

leaflet on the abortion referendum from 1992,” says Alan. The highly emotive language in the trifold leaflet accuses those in favour of easing the ban on travel to England for women seeking an abortion of supporting “the vicious killing of defenceless Irish babies by English doctors”.

Some of Alan’s nephews were at the opening of the exhibition. “They’re in their 20s now but they couldn’t believe how vitriolic the debates around things like abortion and divorce really were. I think this leaflet really encapsulates that.”

Having the exhibition on public display in

5 Bernie Murphy – a favourite Cork ‘legend’ the National Print Museum and it being opened by Taoiseach Enda Kenny has been very beneficial for the archive, Alan notes.

“A great thing about the exhibition is that people come to see it and then come back to drop in leaflets and whatever else they have at home.”

Alan Kinsella is always grateful for donations of political literature.

TO SEE SOME OF THE ARCHIVE, GET MORE INFORMATION AND FOR DETAILS ON HOW TO MAKE A DONATION, VISIT:

irishelectionliterature.wordpress.com

ap012-013.qxd

23/04/2014

10:15

Page 1

12 May / Bealtaine 2014

www.anphoblacht.com

POLITICAL EDUCATION

GETTING THE POLITICAL MESSAGE

ELECTION TIME. And Sinn Féin activists are out canvassing, distributing leaflets and putting up posters.

But, most importantly, it is a time to get the POLITICAL message across.

During elections, people are generally more willing to engage in political debate. This is a great opportunity for canvassers but also a challenge: some of those being canvassed might know a lot more about politics than you think.

To canvass properly, an activist needs to know what the party’s policies are but also understand what its strategy is and how it was formed.

This is why political education is so important. Such education is not just for the slack times but is in fact even more urgent during election time.

The Sinn Féin Education Department has prepared sessions especially for candidates but all members can use its recommended reading lists.

The more you read, the better you will understand the policies and strategy of the party.

A full list of recommended reading can be had from the department but listed here are some basic texts which all members will find useful.

REPUBLICANISM To understand republicanism, take a look at Pádraig Pearse’s seminal work The Sovereign People.

For more background and analysis read T. A. Jackson’s Ireland Her Own, and E. Strauss’s classical

During elections, people are generally more willing to engage in political debate

BY EOIN Ó MURCHÚ work, Irish Nationalism and British Democracy.

Connolly’s Labour in Irish History places the fight for national freedom and social emancipation together, while Desmond Greaves’s study Liam Mellows and the Irish Revolution explains how it all happened.

Sinn Féin’s fight, of course, is an anti-colonial one, and where better to find stimulus than in two classical analyses from the Third World: Albert Memmi’s The Coloniser and the Colonised and Frantz Fanon’s Wretched of the Earth.

IRISH LANGUAGE AND WOMEN The role of the Irish language in the struggle is well shown in Mairtín Ó Cadhain’s pamphlet Gluaiseacht

na Gaeilge: Gluaiseacht Ar Strae (a translation of which in English can be found), while making sure that women’s issues and the feminist programme are put firmly on the agenda can be helped by reading Ursula Barry’s edition of articles Where Are We Now: New Feminist Perspectives in Contemporary Ireland, accessible only online as far as we know. (http://eprints.nuim.ie /1171/1/MMWhere.pdf)

EDUCATION Of course, the big story of the

The more you read, the better you will understand the policies and strategy of the party

elections will be the economy and the role of the EU in particular.

A good discussion of modern socialist economic theory can be found in After Neoliberalism? The Kilburn Manifesto, edited by Stuart Hall, Doreen Massey and Michael Rustin.

And as regards Irish economic development, a very stimulating book is Todd Andrews’s Man of No Property. Todd was a founder member of Fianna Fáil in its radical phase but however the party disgraced itself subsequently this book is still worth studying.

And as regards the European Union, where better than The Great Deception by Christopher Booker and Richard North. A bit Anglocentric but exposes well the myths about this would-be super-state.

So get out canvassing but make sure you read as well so that you can win not just the people’s votes but their belief, their support and their understanding.

ap012-013.qxd

23/04/2014

10:16

Page 2

www.anphoblacht.com

May / Bealtaine 2014 13

From Thomas Davis to Bobby Sands to Nelson Mandela

the importance of an environment where ideas are conceived, discussed and adopted

‘Educate that you may be free’ delivered to activists across the island and presents in the form of five key modules:

BY LIAM LAPPIN & DARREN O’ROURKE

1) 2) 3) 4) 5)

SINN FÉIN POLITICAL EDUCATION COMMITTEE “EDUCATE that you may be free” is a powerful revolutionary quote given to us

by Thomas Davis. It is often used by other revolutionary movements across the world but what is our understanding of these formidable words and how do we interpret and relate them to our struggle and its strategic objectives?

Information and knowledge are key components required by revolutionary activists for the successful methodology and prosecution of their political aims and objectives. It’s how we develop as activists, how we challenge ourselves, how we improve.

Activists need to be completely immersed in the fundamental principles and theories of their political ideology, history and policies in order to review progress, contribute to deci-

5 Nelson Mandela and anti-apartheid resistance campaigner Walter Sisulu on Robben Island

The principle of revolutionary organisations as learning organisations is not a new one sion making and to understand the rationale behind, and significance of, tactics and methods employed.

It is essentially about being equipped with the requisite knowledge to become confident persuaders and advocates of our vision and having the ability to offset and counteract any negative elements aimed at disrupting our project.

To Irish republicans, political discussion and education is about being rooted and grounded in the core principles and ideals of what we’re about. It’s about calibrating, and vigorously testing, our political compass. It’s about provoking fresh ideas and radical thought in a comradely way while challenging disparity and discrimination. It’s about having the ability to recognise societal inequalities and injustices while having a clear understanding about the

5 Long Kesh was known as the University of Freedom

alternative and new ‘Ireland of Equals’ which we’re in the business of creating.

The principle of revolutionary organisations as learning organisations is not a new one, nor is it unique to Ireland. From Thomas Davis to Bobby Sands to Nelson Mandela, there has been a long history of successful leaders with a clear understanding of the importance of creating an environment where ideas could be conceived, discussed, debated and adopted.

Mandela wrote of his time on Robben Island: “At night, our cell block seemed more like a study hall than a prison.”

Many Irish republicans understood firsthand what “Long Kesh - University of Freedom” meant. More of us were just happy to wear the T-shirt!

The need for political activists to reflect regularly through the medium of political discussion and education is a continual process. It should be recognised as such. We are all lifelong learners and should seek to continually improve our knowledge base and our understanding in a collective effort to improve not only the quality of our struggle but our Ireland of the future.

Sinn Féin has sought to actively encourage political discussion and debate with the recent launch of a new political education programme. This programme is currently being

Republican ideology Republican history Republican strategy Party structure and constitution Policy overview

Political education has never been more accessible, particularly now in this modern technological era where information can be found instantly, no further than the buttons of a keyboard away.

It further manifests itself in the daily environments where we live and work, whether that is in the form of books or DVDs, documentaries, debates, lectures or discussions. We are surrounded with the resources and equipment which can further enhance our political maturity and progress. While the new Sinn Féin programme is not intended to be an exclusive or definitive project, it provides an excellent overview and a starting point for us all to engage more critically with our struggle, allowing us to further challenge our politics and improve our vision and expectation of the new Ireland which we continue to strive towards.

The need for political activists to reflect regularly through the medium of political discussion and education is a continual process With local and European elections only weeks away, it is clear that the Irish freedom struggle is now at a critical juncture. We have never been closer to the realisation of our aims and objectives but there is still some way to travel. While political progress continues to be made by the work of dedicated activists coupled with innovative initiatives, magnanimous gestures and Irish society’s growing appreciation of the relevance of core republican values, it is true to say that constant reflection to political education has never been more necessary.

Many have passed this juncture in the past and lost their way. Let the words of Thomas Davis act as an inspiration in the important times ahead.

ap014-015.qxd

23/04/2014

10:21

Page 1

14 May / Bealtaine 2014

www.anphoblacht.com

Thousands rally in Belfast in support of Irish language rights and demanding better promotion and protection of Gaeilge

NO HOLDS BARRED

in Establishment attacks on Sinn Féin

BY EOIN Ó MURCHÚ WITH the consistent growth in Sinn Féin’s electoral support North and South, there has been an increasingly frenetic media campaign of demonisation and distortion - in which the notorious Sunday Independent has played a leading, though not exclusive, role.

There is very little attempt to analyse the policies and strategies of the party, however. Instead, while playing the demonisation card as the main weapon, any excuse will be jumped on to further the reactionary agenda, accusing the party of having abandoned republicanism and joined the Establishment.

The role of Anthony McIntyre and the Boston College Project are well-known in this regard, with media opponents of armed struggle like RTÉ’s Prime Time quite happy to rely on those who condemn the ending of armed struggle to further their attacks on the party.

And even responsible journalists like Vincent Browne are happy to join in, accusing Sinn Féin of implementing austerity policies in the North that it opposes in the South.

The problem with these criticisms, like those from otherwise genuine republicans, is that they ignore the actual context in which Sinn Féin operates and the strategic priorities which the party must put forward.

All thinking people now understand that the achievement of a democratic reunification of the country – that is a united Ireland which implements social and economic equality for its citizens – must involve at the least the acquiescence of the Protestant population in the North which still sees its interests as tied in with the connection to Britain.

The Peace Process is founded on the need to create conditions in which the discriminations of the past can be stopped and real equality of respect for both communities established so that the Protestant/unionist community can come to see that reunification, far from being a threat, is a guarantee to future prosperity and community development.

In this regard, republican leaders have repeatedly made it clear that the Good Friday and St

Sinn Féin has consistently demanded that fiscal powers be devolved from Westminster to Stormont

Journalist Vincent Browne

Andrews agreements are not the end of the process but intermediate steps which create the space to strengthen the republican position by constructively neutralising opposition.

In other words, it is what it says it is – a process; not a conclusion.

Of course, this means that the scope of what Sinn Féin can achieve through the Northern Executive is limited. For example, the Executive has no power to raise funds through specific fiscal measures and little power to oppose other fiscal measures imposed by Britain from the Westminster parliament.

The ultra-Left (those who consider themselves more left-wing than anyone else) argue that Sinn Féin should refuse to operate under such conditions.

Of course, this would mean the collapse of the existing institutions. And the question should be put: do those who demand such a move recognise that without these institutions sectarianism will be given a free rein with an inevitable push back to the internecine conflict from which we have escaped?

The point should be made about the ‘All or Nothing’ approach of these purist critics is that the result of All or

Nothing is invariably Nothing.

This doesn’t mean that Sinn Féin can never make mistakes or that it is beyond criticism. But it does mean that criticism needs to be made within the framework of understanding the context.

For example, in April there was a major rally in Belfast to demand Irish language rights. Sinn Féin was to the fore in this rally, quite rightly. But the party has been criticised because of its involvement in the Executive and cross-Border bodies which some believe are doing less than they should.

Indeed, at St Andrews, the two governments and the DUP agreed to the republican demand that there be a Language Act in the North. But the DUP have refused to honour this commitment and both governments – BOTH – have done nothing to bring it about.

Should Sinn Féin bring down the Executive, or should they support the popular movement to

Far from becoming part of the Establishment, Sinn Féin is increasingly becoming the standard bearer for what a new Ireland will be like bring pressure on the governments to see the St Andrews commitments implemented?

And for people like Vincent Browne, the economic restraints on republicans in the North are ‘proof’ that they would do nothing about austerity in the South, ignoring the fact that Sinn Féin is the only party in the Executive to demand the transfer of fiscal powers, a transfer that Browne himself has never referred to.

The South does have fiscal powers to tax or not tax, and Sinn Féin’s programme is one that fills the Establishment with dread.

Far from becoming part of the Establishment, Sinn Féin is increasingly becoming the standard bearer for what a new Ireland will be like: an Ireland of community equality, founded on economic equality, true national sovereignty, and the undoing of the Conquest, not least by the revival of our indigenous language.

ap014-015.qxd

23/04/2014

10:22

Page 2

www.anphoblacht.com

May / Bealtaine 2014 15

Bik McFarlane in Switzerland on the historic struggle in the H-Blocks, Long Kesh and Ireland

‘ONLY THEIR RIVERS RUN FREE’

BY JULIE DUCHATEL IN GENEVA, SWITZERLAND

BIK McFARLANE, former Officer Commanding the IRA prisoners in the HBlocks of Long Kesh, was invited by the ‘100 Fuegos Collective’ to Geneva in March 2014 for a discussion and a concert around the 1981 Irish Hunger Strikers and Irish republicanism.

L’Usine, where the event took place, is a famous ‘alternative’ place in Switzerland and Europe where independent music bands can perform on three stages.

There are also a self-managed theatre, cinema, radio, record shop and bar. Affordable shows, activism, alternative and counter culture, and solidarity are some key words to describe the atmosphere at l’Usine.

Introducing Bik to an enthusiastic audience eager to learn about the Irish struggle for freedom, I explained that, through Bik’s account, we would find ourselves in the core struggle that took place in Long Kesh.

We would face an account about the worst prison conditions in the heart of Europe, about the tangible violence of the British imperialism and the means used to try and break the political prisoners’ conscience, their will and their bodies. His presence would also stand for a straight testimony regarding the unimaginable trial the Hunger Strike represented. It is still very hard and almost impossible to me – to all of us I guess – more than 30 years later, to imagine how Bik and his comrades had to constantly fight against his emotions by seeing his closest friends and comrades dying one by one, inside and outside the jail.

Through Bik’s presence, we were able to ‘touch history’ that night, so many years after such a sacrifice.

Bik embodies the beautiful Bobby Sands biography Denis O’Hearn wrote a few years ago, which we translated into French.

This evening, we also paid tribute to the nine comrades of Bobby Sands that followed him and laid down their lives. If Bobby Sands remains the most popular and internationally well-known fig-

ure, we know perfectly well that there is no cult of personality of any kind in the Irish republican struggle. This is why we wanted to remind new generations of the names, the stories and the struggles of Francis Hughes, Raymond McCreesh, Pasty O’Hara, Joe McDonnell, Martin Hurson, Kevin Lynch, Kieran Doherty, Tom McElwee and Mickey Devine.

This was a well-attended conference, especially by young people. I said a few words about the historical context and about the Bobby Sands biogra-

5 Julie and Bik at the conference in Switzerland

phy. For me it is quite important to read this book as it is not a biography like any other, it invites us to think further and deeper about issues like the artistic creation under the worst conditions of repression and confinement, about the meaning of comradeship and solidarity under repressive situations, about what is at stake when a people’s struggle is criminalised (Denis O’Hearn explains brilliantly the way Bobby and his comrades understood their fight in jail was crucial for the republican struggle outside the prison walls).

Bobby Sands belongs to humanity and to something that is way bigger than the Irish struggle. His memory and what he stands for is remembered everywhere in the world, either by the Mapuches in Chile, by women cleaners on strike in Italy (as Joe Austin explained to us one day) or in so many other areas of struggle.

Bik presented to the audience in Switzerland the republican struggle in Ireland before and after the 1981 Hunger Strike and the legacy of hunger strike.

After Bik’s contributions and insights into life and death in the H-Blocks of Long Kesh (brilliantly translated into French by Garance), the audience had the opportunity to talk with Bik and ask him in a Q&A about different issues as the South of Ireland, capitalism, the Peace Process, etc.

Then we went to the Makhno bar where a twohour, fully-packed concert with Bik took place.

It was the end of an event that reminded some and opened the eyes and minds of others to the epic struggle that was captured within the walls of the H-Blocks and Long Kesh throughout all the years and Ireland’s struggle.

Thank you, Bik.

ap016-017.qxd

23/04/2014

10:22

Page 1

16 May / Bealtaine 2014

www.anphoblacht.com

Charles Saatchi, Whitney Huston, Matt Lucas, Courtney Love, Michael Portillo and Kate Moss have all bought his paintings – now Ireland’s most prolific artist tells JOHN HEDGES why he's joined Sinn Féin

KEVIN SHARKEY SEES THE BIG PICTURE

LAUGHING AT and debating artist Kevin Sharkey’s provocative, funny, raw and searingly honest views on life growing up black and Irish in 1960s Ireland to become one of our most internationally successful artists left me wondering briefly at 10am on a wet Monday morning in Dublin after an hour-long, rapidfire repartee why the former presenter isn’t on TV or radio more often.

It’s probably because the likes of Marian Finucane’s shows couldn’t handle him. He’s too honest.

He’s not impressed by TV management in Ireland or its reliance on ‘the usual suspects’ (or friends) for its panels and commentaries.

The Dublin-born black personality raised in Donegal has publicly lambasted RTÉ for its slowness to reflect the changing cultural profile of the people of Ireland.

“Every face I see on RTÉ is a white face,” The Irish Sun reported him saying in December. “It feels like apartheid when I see all these white faces.”

He understands how people’s attitudes are influenced by their upbringing and experiences and admits to An Phoblacht that he has prejudices but adds that that shouldn’t impact on people’s rights as human beings.

“There’s a difference between holding what are racist views and wanting to burn people out of their homes because they’re black or come from Eastern Europe.”

Racism has always been with us, he says, but adds: “We all need to get over our prejudices. In Ireland, we are a nation who pride ourselves in our identity but it shouldn’t be to the exclusion of other people who want to contribute.”

The Iona Institute/John Waters ‘Pantigate’ controversy naturally comes into any discussion of identity.

“For me it’s never been about black rights or gay rights, it’s always been about human rights. As a human being I deserve the right to fall in love with who I want, not who somebody else thinks I should, and as a human being I deserve to be treated as equal – that’s it.

“I think that’s what we’ve shifted away from, where you have idiots like John Waters and the Iona Institute turning the whole issue into ‘Oh, but you’re bad people, you’re sinners.’”

Kevin spreads his hands upwards as if delivering a religious sermon and continues: “Hang on a minute. You guys believe in God? So, you like the sunset, you like the seas, you like the flowers, you like the birds. So did God have a hangover when he was making gays?”

FROM KILLYBEGS TO KIRSTY MacCOLL Kevin was born in Dublin in 1961 but raised in Killybegs, County Donegal, by a foster fam-

5 Kevin's limited editon 'United Ireland' prints have proven to be very popular ily. There were very few black people in Ireland at that time.

Kevin laughs now at the everyday, unthinking attitudes of even very caring, kind people towards a black child growing up in rural Ireland.

“The lovely woman up the road, by no means racist, used to give me a banana when she gave all the other kids Marietta biscuits.

One day I threw the banana down and she

asked me what was wrong. What was wrong?

I wanted a fucking Marietta biscuit like everybody else!”

In adult life, he has met his estranged siblings in London but growing up as the only black kid in town (“I didn’t see another black kid until I was nearly 13”) was testing.

“I grew up thinking, ‘Fuck, I’m from Killybegs – that makes me a culchie. Shit. Then I know I’m black. Oh, no! And then a couple of years

kevinsharkeygallery.com 35 Molesworth Street, Dublin 2 Open seven days a week, 10am to 6pm www.facebook.com/kevin.sharkey

later, when I realised I might be gay, I thought: ‘Oh, come on, you’re having a fucking laugh.’

Black, Irish and gay!

“So I spent years trying to be anything than what was staring me in the face. In the end, I was able to come back full circle and realise that those four things – being a culchie, being black, being gay, being Irish – they are bonuses because when you’re in a minority you become a fighter who takes on challenges and perceptions.”

He went from his foster family in Donegal into care in an industrial school in Galway run by the Christian Brothers (“the meanest bunch of fuckers I’ve ever met”) before leaving and sampling a wide range of jobs.

As well as being Ireland’s first black TV presenter in 1985/86 as co-host with Flo McSweeney fronting RTÉ’s Megamix music show (credited with showcasing bands such as Aslan, The Pogues and Something Happens), he’s been on RTÉ’s Celebrity Farm and been a fisherman, an actor, a model, a chef at the Hard Rock Café, and a cleaner in London to singer Kirsty MacColl. Kevin was at Kirsty’s wedding to Steve Lillywhite, the Grammy award-winning record producer for The Rolling Stones, U2, Big Country, Peter Gabriel, Talking Heads, Morrissey, Siouxsie and the Banshees, Simple Minds and Joan Armatrading.

“The day I got a job with RTÉ as a presenter, do you know what Kirsty’s first words to me were? ‘Does that mean you won’t be able to come and clean anymore?’

“Hello! I was a good cleaner but what happened to ‘Congratulations, my cleaner’s going to be famous’?”

Kirsty and Kevin remained firm friends up until Kirsty’s death in 2000.

He’s also written music for Boney M with Bob Geldof and for Geldof himself, who Kevin describes as “a real grumpy old bugger, wouldn’t spend a penny on a cup of tea but a very intelligent man with a heart of gold and loves his kids”. (Our interview took place three weeks before Geldof’s daughter, Peaches, was found dead from unknown causes at the age of 25 with her 11-month-old son by her side.)

Thinking back to his growing up in rural Ireland, he chortles at the small part he had in a couple of episodes of Father Ted, playing a ‘Fr Shaft’. In one scene, Fr Shaft is asked by a nun what he thinks of all the work being done by priests in Africa, to which he replies: “Sure I wouldn’t know, I’m from Donegal.”

He laughs uproariously when he recounts being chosen as a model for another part by world-famous photographer David Bailey (“the ultimate celebrity photographer” – Daily Telegraph). David Bailey’s subjects include The Beatles, Mick Jagger, Rudolf Nureyev, Andy Warhol and East End gangsters the Kray twins. And Kevin Sharkey.

“David Bailey photographed my dick!” Kevin screams with a triumphant roar. “How’s that?

Everyone’s had their face photographed by him; I figure if you’re going to be pho-

ap016-017.qxd

23/04/2014

10:23

Page 2

www.anphoblacht.com

May / Bealtaine 2014 17

5 Kevin was RTÉ’s first black presenter when he fronted the Megamix music programme with Flo McSweeney in 1985

5 Kevin Sharkey with his design ‘Moolah The Cow’ tographed by David Bailey, you may as well make it memorable.”

CHARLES SAATCHI AND A ‘UNITED IRELAND’ Self-taught, Kevin says he took up art “as therapy”, explaining that after what he’d been through, “If I wasn’t going to be creative I was going to be destructive.”

Other people took notice of his talent and he realised he could make a living pursuing his passion when he got almost instant global recognition with Charles Saatchi buying a small painting of his in London.

“Suddenly, people were calling me from all over the world out of the blue. I didn’t know who he was then but he is seen as a trend setter, as a sort of weather vane in the art world and it took off from there.”

A full-time artist since 1972, Kevin has earned a name as a prolific artist, producing some 9,000 pieces in 12 years.

One of his most recent pieces he’s particularly proud of is titled ‘United Ireland’. It’s a

4 Kevin Sharkey speaks to An Phoblacht at his gallery in Dublin

signed, limited edition print run on canvas, each one with its own certificate of authenticity, of which there are only 300 at €325 each.

Making art accessible to ‘ordinary’ people is part of Kevin Sharkey’s perspective about painting.

“I’ve had my paintings bought by window cleaners, road sweepers, swimming pool attendants, housewives, grannies, and so many of them had never bought a painting before. That is a huge compliment for me as somebody who is self-taught. I feel priv-

ileged that I can give some pleasure and happiness to people who hadn’t enjoyed owning a painting before.”

His work has sold for up to €30,000 for an individual piece. Twice a year, Kevin has a studio clearance sale where all his paintings are €500 (he also has payment plans for individuals or groups to make it easier to buy).

“Galleries say I should charge much more but at three grand a painting you have to seriously think about it and get all the family’s

views on it. Five hundred quid is not nothing but it’s not a fortune for a painting.”

“The ones I sell mean other people can enjoy them and I can still be an artist tomorrow and next week as well. Without that, it’s just dream.”

ARTIST TO ACTIVIST Kevin Sharkey joined Sinn Féin in September of last year.

“Why? Because it’s the best ticket in town at the moment.

“Sinn Féin is the most exciting political party that I can find and it’s probably peopled by some of the most dedicated, focused and,” he says, pausing before he adds, “principled people. I didn’t find that in politics much.

“I grew up with Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and the usual and my family and people around me voted that way but, ultimately, it’s the same old show, it’s the same old thing.

“In terms of rooting for the small guy and woman, it’s Sinn Féin that does the business.”

Kevin has been impressed not just by the party’s political progress but by its leaders’ character.

“Gerry Adams – legend, absolute fucking legend,” Kevin says, inhaling deeply, giving his pronouncement added emphasis. “That’s a man who will be talked about long after you and me are forgotten, a statesman and a man of incredible integrity, belief and principle.

“When I looked at the party and met Mary Lou [McDonald], what I found was a group of solid people who believed in something rather than being on the gravy train, feathering their own nests or lining their own pockets.”

You can see the Dáil from Kevin’s gallery at 35 Molesworth Street and his admiration and affection for Mary Lou McDonald shine through.

“When I see Mary Lou in the Dáil talking about the Rehab bosses and other issues and you see that this is a woman who has not just a huge heart but someone who uses her day, her brain, her family, her life to create a better Ireland for all of us.

“I joined Sinn Féin because I believe Sinn Féin are the future.”

ap018-019.qxd

23/04/2014

10:24

Page 1

18 May / Bealtaine 2014

www.anphoblacht.com

West Belfast MLA ROSIE McCORLEY explains why Sinn Féin is backing Foras na Gaeilge proposals

FIGHTING FOR AN GHAEILGE AT EVERY LEVEL

BY PEADAR WHELAN AS the debate around the place of the Irish language in society intensifies across the country, it is clear that more and more people are recognising the value of an Ghaeilge to the well-being of the nation.

More and more people accept that the language will prosper if it is promoted as a central plank of our heritage and culture.

The popular support for the language (seen when a reported 10,000 people marched in February in the capital for Lá Mór na Gaeilge) isn’t matched by officialdom.

In the North, the British Government and the unionist parties refuse to legislate for Acht na Gaeilge; while in the South, despite its status as the ‘official’ language, Irish is tolerated as another box to be ticked, irrelevant to people as part of their national identity.

In the face of this ‘official’ cynicism and the apathy engendered by it, the work of language groups, of teachers and many thousands of enthusiasts is bearing fruit.

Slowly but surely, they are bringing Irish centre stage.

One of the big actors in this drama, Foras na Gaeilge, published its proposals for the development of the language in January 2014. One was the reorganisation of

Rosie McCorley MLA

funding for Irish-language groups with the proposed structures, reducing the number of core-funded organisations from 19 to 6.

Needless to say, the Foras proposals have generated much debate, especially as none of the groups nominated for core funding is based in the North.

It is no surprise that the immediate reaction of some Northern Gaeilgeoirí to the planned shake up has been negative.

Speaking to An Phoblacht, West Belfast MLA Rosie McCorley outlined Sinn Féin’s thinking and strategy around the language and explained why the party is backing the Foras proposals.

McCorley welcomed the announcement, describing it

as “an important landmark in all-Ireland language development”.

She added: “Sinn Féin welcomes the new arrangements because they bring clarity, certainty, stability and cohesion to the promotion of the Irish language throughout the 32 Counties.

“The previous arrangement with 19 core funded organisations was wasteful, involving much overlapping and lack of cohesion with some operating in one jurisdiction only.

“The new arrangements, with six lead organisations, will contribute greatly to the effective implementation of the language strategies North and South.”

She also pointed out that, while none of the six lead organisations is based in the North, at least 25% of the services will be provided in the North.

“My own preference is that those language activists who have been delivering excellent services over the years will continue to do so under the new arrangements.

“However, Foras funds will continue to go to projects like An Chultúrlann, An Droichead, Glór na Móna, Raidió Fáilte, An tÁisaonad, Croí Éanna, Skainos, the McCracken Cultural Society, the Ivy Centre and others besides.”

‘Sinn Féin welcomes the new arrangements because they bring clarity, certainty, stability and cohesion to the promotion of the Irish language throughout the 32 Counties’

Rosie McCorley went on to explain that Foras na 5 In the North, the British Government and the unionist Gaeilge, which was set up under the Good Friday parties refuse to legislate for Agreement, has responsibility for the Irish language throughout the 32 Counties and as such it is the most Acht na Gaeilge powerful tool available to Irish-language activists and official agencies alike, notwithstanding the difficulties that have been experienced by groups under Foras.

‘The previous arrangement with 19 core funded organisations was wasteful, involving much overlapping and lack of cohesion with some operating in one jurisdiction only’

She pointed out that, as far back as 2008, Foras recognised the need to review the structures of the core-funded Irish-language organisations.

“As a result an external review (the Mazars Report) was carried out and, following an Equality Impact Assessment, the North/South Ministerial Council agreed to changes in the system of core funding.

“These changes are aimed at getting value for money

THE SIX AREAS OF WORK PAIRED WITH THE RELEVANT LEAD ORGANISATION ARE . . .

THE SIX AREAS OF WORKIRISH PAIRED WITH THE RELEVANT LEAD ORGANISATION ARE:IRISH-MEDIUM IN LANGUAGE-CENTRED EDUCATION

Gaelscoileanna Teo

ENGLISHMEDIUM EDUCATION

Gael-Linn

COMMUNITY AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

Glór na nGael

ap018-019.qxd

23/04/2014

10:25

Page 2

www.anphoblacht.com

May / Bealtaine 2014 19

SINN FÉIN, THE DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION AND THE IRISH LANGUAGE

funded lead organisations are maximised to their full potential there should be a significant increase in Irishlanguage sector employment in the Six Counties.

“The Foras outlook envisages the national language movement and local initiatives working in tandem so there is no need for concern that the North’s needs would not be catered for and that these particular needs will be included in work programmes and job distribution.”

The West Belfast MLA reiterated the party’s backing for those groups and organisations whose work ‘on the ground’ has been pivotal to the language’s growth.

“We will support and accommodate local language groups seeking to develop and grow.

“The Irish language recognises no borders and we will be working towards 32-County language harmony within a set timescale.”

Rosie McCorley was also keen to point out that Sinn Féin’s Executive Ministers Carál Ní Chuilín in the

5 Sinn Féin Minister Carál Ní Chuilín has put her shoulder to the wheel when it comes to promoting the Irish language and effective delivery of services and obligations and involved the introduction of six distinct areas of work.”

She outlined these areas of activity as:1 Irish-medium/immersion education and Irish-medium pre-school education; 2 Awareness raising, language protection and representation; 3 Education in the English-language sector and for adults, and opportunities for school pupils to use the language; 4 Opportunities which support the use of Irish and the establishment of networks; 5 Community and economic development; 6 Development of opportunities for use of Irish and of networks for young people.

Answering those critics who say the North may lose out due to the new arrangements, McCorley said although there will be fewer organisations being funded under the new model the opportunities brought about for sharing expertise are exciting.

“The percentage of core-funded employment in the Six Counties will increase slightly and if the six new core-

‘My own preference is that those language activists who have been delivering excellent services over the years will continue to do so under the new arrangements’

Department of Culture, Arts and Leisure (DCAL) and John O’Dowd in Education have been putting their shoulders to the wheel when it come to promoting the Irish language.

DCAL’s Líofa initiative has, so far, signed 5,000 people up to be fluent in Irish by 2015.

“We want the Líofa initiative to be taken up by the Minister of State for the Gaeltacht in the South,” McCorley said.

“DCAL has also provided bursaries to the less-well-off and those on benefits, enabling them to go on intensive residential Irish courses in the Gaeltacht,” she added.

Sinn Féin, McCorley stressed, also argued for the establishment of the Irish Language Broadcast Fund to finance high-quality programming and develop an independent Irish-speaking production sector in the North. Training is an important element of this work.

The party negotiated a further £12million for the fund in 2010. A minimum of 70% of production costs is spent in the North, thus boosting local employment.

And at the Hillsborough talks in 2010, Gerry Adams secured £8million funding for Ciste Infheistíochta Gaeilge (CIG.) This is being used to build the physical infrastructure required to meet the needs of the burgeoning Irish-language community in the North.

IN 1999, in one of his first acts as Minister for Education, Martin McGuinness established the advisory body Comhairle na Gaelscolaíochta and Iontaobhas na Gaelscolaíochta with an investment fund of £2million for capital investment in Irish-medium schools.

He awarded full-time statutory status to Naíscoil Bhreandáin and Bunscoil an tSléibhe Dhuibh, in Belfast, and established an investment of £2million in classroom resources for all levels of Irish-medium education.

He also signed off on Irish-medium pre-school provision in eight areas and approved of Irish-medium education in six new areas, including Glengormley, Crumlin and Magherafelt.

McGuinness also approved post-primary provision in Armagh and Tyrone.

But it was at the level of training where he increased curricular support for Irish teachers and staff throughout the Education and Library Boards and the Regional Training Unit that Sinn Féin made a structural impact on Irish-medium education.

McGuinness adopted all the recommendations of The Review of IrishMedium Education (IME) resulting in: » The Literacy and Numeracy Strategy for IME; » Revised curriculum for IME; » Diagnostic testing for children in IME; » Phonic reading support for children in IME; » Irish-language training for teachers and classroom assistants in IME. He also increased the number of teacher training places in IME and invested between £25million and £30million in capital investment in either building new schools or improving existing ones.

Coláiste Feirste in Belfast, which Gerry Adams championed since it was founded in 1991, has received something in the region of £18million in recent years.

When Martin McGuinness first took on the Education brief there were 1,461 pupils in 18 Irish-medium schools; today there are 4,627 pupils in 67 schools or units.

There are now 24 stand-alone government-funded schools in the North, plus a further 13 units attached to English-medium schools.

Education Minister John O’Dowd funds Comhairle na Gaelscolaíochta to the tune of £839,000.

LANGUAGE USE

LANGUAGE AWARENESS

YOUTH NETWORKS

Oireachtas na Gaeilge

Conradh na Gaeilge

Cumann na bhFiann

Joint First Minister Martin McGuinness

Education Minister John O’Dowd MLA The Department of Education spends £16.25million on Irish-medium education plus an unprecedented £20million capital investment in Irish-language schools.

Rosie McCorley pointed out: “It was Sinn Féin who brought Irishlanguage equality issues into the Good Friday Agreement negotiations, which is why we took on the Education and DCAL (Department of Culture, Arts and Leisure) briefs in the Executive.

“Equally, it was Sinn Féin who proposed the establishment of the allIreland body for the Irish-language Foras na Gaeilge and we negotiated its responsibilities, membership, structure and budget.

“Though we won the argument for an Irish Language Act in the North during the St Andrews talks, British and Irish unionism have been blocking it since, but we are as determined as ever to bring Acht na Gaeilge into law and we won’t stop until the legislation is in place.”

ap020-021.qxd

23/04/2014

10:26

Page 1

20 May / Bealtaine 2014

www.anphoblacht.com

Drivers of the revolution Thomas Clarke

By Helen Litton

Seán Mac Diarmada

By Brian Feeney 16 Lives series, by O’Brien Press

BOOKS REVIEW BY MÍCHEÁL Mac DONNCHA AT CHRISTMAS 1915, 22 people gathered for Christmas dinner at the home of veteran Fenian John Daly in Limerick.

Among the guests were John Daly’s niece and nephew, Kathleen Clarke and Edward Daly; his old comrade Tom Clarke, who was Kathleen’s husband; and their friends Con Colbert and Seán Mac Diarmada. Within six months of that Christmas dinner, four of those present (Con Colbert, Edward Daly, Tom Clarke and Seán Mac Diarmada) were executed in Kilmainham Jail by British Army firing squads.

The latest two books in the superb 16 Lives series on the executed leaders of 1916 are the biographies of two of that group that gathered in Limerick: Tom Clarke and Seán Mac Diarmada.

Without question, these two men were the drivers of the revolution because they, more than any others, put in place the elements that ensured that there would be a Rising in 1916.

These are contrasting but complementary biographies.

In his study of Seán Mac Diarmada, Brian Feeney naturally emphasises the political, given that Mac Diarmada was totally consumed by his commitment to the republican struggle. Helen Litton places more emphasis on Tom Clarke’s family life, using his correspondence and the memoirs of Kathleen. But, of course, Clarke was just as committed as Mac Diarmada and family came second to Ireland, as Kathleen, a staunch republican in her own right, frankly admitted.

Helen Litton provides a vivid portrait of Clarke, making clear his absolute determination to strike a successful blow for Irish freedom.

During his long years in English prisons he saw his comrades die prematurely and go mad under the punitive regime. He also saw how the Fenian movement was divided by splits and many of its activities compromised by spies and informers.

Did all this make him bitter and motivated by a desire for revenge against Britain? The author concludes that it did and disagrees with previous authors who say he was without bitterness. It is impossible to know what his inner thoughts were as he wrote little and spoke relatively rarely in public. But I find myself agreeing with the earlier writers and concluding that, on balance, Clarke’s prime motivation must have been a positive one – deep patriotism, love of country and desire for freedom. There is no trace of bitterness in his Glimpses of an Irish Felon’s Prison Life.

Clarke and Mac Diarmada were expert conspirators, implementing the original Fenian idea of a conspiratorial network of committed activists well-

5 A young Thomas Clarke

5 Seán Mac Diarmada, Thomas Clarke and the veteran Fenian John Daly, who served time in prison with Clarke

prepared to strike at an unsuspecting British regime in Ireland at the opportune moment.

Together they revived the Irish Republican Brotherhood. When necessary, they kept even some of their senior IRB colleagues (like Denis McCullough of Belfast) in the dark about their plans. Their tight secrecy and control ensured that the preparations for the Rising were not compromised by spies or informers.

These two men, more than any others, put in place the elements that ensured that there would be a Rising in 1916

But conspiracy has its limits. It created a dichotomy in the Irish Volunteers between IRB and non-IRB officers. It added to the confusion in the days leading up to the Rising when the elaborate plans of Clarke and Mac Diarmada began to unravel with the capture of the German arms ship, the arrest of Roger Casement and Eoin Mac Neill’s disastrous countermanding order.

That Clarke and Mac Diarmada, amidst all this welter of confusion and dismay, kept their heads and drove on

5 A group of Irish Volunteer officers pose for a photo in Cork, 1915, with Seán Mac Diarmada seated third from the left

5 Mrs O'Donovan Rossa and daughter Eileen sitting with Tom Clarke and Fr Michael Flanagan (standing) with the Rising, speaks volumes of their determination and courage and that of the other leaders and of the rank and file of the movement.

The republican leaders planned for a successful Rising, not for a blood sacrifice. All the scholarship of recent years confirms that, and this is also reflected in these books. The plans for the Rising are better understood, especially since more information has become available from the Bureau of Military History accounts of veterans.

But the leaders also saw that it was vital for the morale and self-respect of the Irish people that a blow for freedom was struck at that time. The ‘Great War’ (First World War) was at its height; it could conclude at any time with victory for either side; there would be an international peace conference and how could Ireland make any case if she had done nothing to assert her independence?

The centenary of the start of the First World War is already seeing a revival of British imperial propaganda, including the myth that the war was fought “for the freedom of small nations”. The British Imperial Government fighting “for freedom” gave to our small nation the execution of the leaders in 1916, mass imprisonment, censorship and repression, the attempt to enforce conscription, the refusal to recognise the will of the people in the 1918 general election and the banning of Dáil Éireann.

Clarke and Mac Diarmada and their comrades ensured that the Irish people rose again and took on that Empire and its lies.

ap020-021.qxd

23/04/2014

10:27

Page 2

www.anphoblacht.com

May / Bealtaine 2014 21

A heroine of republican struggle Doing My Bit for Ireland

By Margaret Skinnider Prologue by Aengus Ó Snodaigh TD

BOOK REVIEW BY MICHAEL MANNION

5 Robert Monteith, Daniel Bailey, Captain Weissbach and Roger Casement onboard German submarine U19 in April 1916

Enemy of the Empire – Roger Casement Roger Casement

By Angus Mitchell, 16 Lives Series, O’Brien Press, €12.99.

BOOK REVIEW BY MÍCHEÁL Mac DONNCHA ROGER CASEMENT was one of the most dangerous enemies that the British Empire ever had. He knew how it worked, he knew many of the leading figures in British politics personally, he was fearless in pursuit of the truth and he paid for this with his life.

Well before he received his knighthood for his almost superhuman humanitarian work exposing mass exploitation of native peoples, Casement was on a collision course with the Empire. In Africa and South America he witnessed the brutality of colonialism and the destruction of millions of lives by the great powers who would soon unleash on the world the mass slaughter of the Great War. He began as a believer in the civilising mission of Liberal England but experience taught him that the reality of imperialism was essentially the same whether it was under the Belgian, German, French or British flag.

He was always an Irish nationalist and his international work deep-

5 Casement (back to camera) in the dock

ened his commitment to Irish independence. He wrote to his friend, the historian Alice Stopford Green: “I knew well that if I told the truth about the devilish Congo conspiracy of robbers I should pay for it in my own future, but when I made up my mind to tell, at all costs, it was the image of my poor old country [that] stood first before my eyes.”

Casement and Green were among the group that organised the shipment of arms to the Irish Volunteers on board the Asgard and the Kelpie, the centenary of which will be marked this summer. A few days after the landings, the Great

MARGARET SKINNIDER is a true heroine of the republican struggle.

Born in Glasgow to Irish parents (the name ‘Skinnider’ is native to Monaghan), the young Margaret immersed herself in her Irish heritage. She is one of the few people to have served in Óglaigh na hÉireann, Cumann na mBan, and the Irish Citizen Army, although it is probably in her role as a Citizen Army soldier that she is best known.

She played an active part in the College of Surgeons garrison in St Stephen’s Green, serving as a sniper on the college roof, from where she claims to have shot several British soldiers who were firing from the roof of the Shelbourne Hotel across the Green.

Margaret became the only female combatant wounded in the Rising when she was shot three times whilst leading a raiding party to burn down a house occupied by a British machine gun post. She was cited in dispatches for bravery on three separate occasions during Easter Week and continued in this courageous manner throughout the Tan War and the Civil War, when she was not only Director of Training for Cumann na mBann, but also the defacto paymaster for the Quartermaster General’s department of the IRA after the fall of the Four Courts.

In later years, Margaret reverted to her teaching career but never wavered in her support for republi-

canism, women’s rights, socialism and trades union activity, eventually becoming President of the Irish National Teachers’ Organisation (INTO).

This book was originally written

by Margaret in late 1916 and early 1917 in America. It was written primarily for an American audience to explain the realities of the Rising and to garner support for prisoners and dependants in Ireland. She sets out the events leading up to the Rising as well as Easter Week itself and the subsequent immediate aftermath.

There is one peculiar passage in the book where Margaret describes James Connolly as a “North of Ireland man from County Monaghan”. This is rather strange as one would have thought that a Glaswegian such as her would have recognised an Edinburgh accent when she heard it (Connolly’s birth certificate confirms that he was born in Scotland).

This new edition of the book is prefaced by a masterly introduction from Aengus Ó Snodaigh TD. His introduction and additional photographs help contextualise both the book and Margaret herself in the overall struggle.

This is a wonderful little book which should be an essential purchase for anyone seeking to expand their knowledge of the events and personalities of Easter Week.

War began. Now fully committed to the Irish Volunteers, Casement threw himself into the task of arming them and of exposing the British Empire internationally for its hypocrisy. While the Germans certainly committed atrocities in Belgium, Casement knew that the British were greatly exaggerating their extent and using propaganda on a scale not seen before in war.

He wrote about this in an essay, The Far-Extended Baleful Power of the Lie, reproduced as an appendix in Angus Mitchell’s book on Roger Casement, a volume in the excellent 16 Lives series published by O’Brien Press.

It was Casement’s single-mindedness and his ability to pursue a cause single-handedly that won him international acclaim in exposing the atrocities in the Congo and the Amazon. But these qualities served him less well when taking on the British Empire in Ireland. It was here that he needed to work in closer co-operation with comrades but instead he pursued the ill-conceived attempt to set up an Irish Brigade in German prison camps among captured Irish soldiers of the British Army.

The British were determined not only to capture and kill Casement but also to destroy his name and used the Black Diaries to do so. His words about the powerful use of lies were prophetic and, as Angus Mitchell shows, the ‘Big Lie’ has been integral to the work of British Intelligence – from Ireland in 1916 to the 2003 war on Iraq. Today the destruction of the Amazon continues and the people of the Congo are victims of a war that has cost millions of lives but is barely known about outside Africa.

Even for those with a good knowledge of Casement, this book has many new insights, written as it is by the leading authority on the subject.

A re-enactment of Casement’s trial, with his superb speech from the dock, would surely be one of the fitting ways to mark the 1916 Centenary in two years 5 View from the roof of the College of Surgeons where Margaret served as a sniper time.

ap022-023.qxd

23/04/2014

10:29

Page 1

22 May / Bealtaine 2014

www.anphoblacht.com

Dr Johnston McMaster

Senior Research Writer and Educator with the Ethical and Shared Remembering Project

Commemoration, memory and history WHO remembers Slobodan Milosevic? He was a hero to some; to others he was ‘The Butcher of the Balkans’, the person who brought genocide and slaughter back to Europe after the Nazi atrocities earlier in the 20th century.

Milosevic was a Serb, bent on eliminating all non-Serbs through massacre and rape. Eight thousand Bosnian Muslims were killed in Srebrenica. Milosevic stirred Serbian nationalism and violence through the manipulation of commemoration.

Within Serbia there was Kosovo. Its population was 85% Albanian, with only 194,000 Serbs who had the better jobs, housing and social privileges. Milosevic invoked memory of the Battle of the Blackbirds Field in 1389. There was already a Serbian national festival but not of the defeat of the Serbs by the Ottoman Empire as it moved into Europe. There was selective memory.

Mainly through songs, the commemoration honoured a Serb, Milosh Obravitch, who in 1389

The Decade of Centenaries, 1912-1922, opens up huge questions around commemoration, how we approach it and how we use memory

had made his way into the Ottoman Sultan’s tent and stabbed the Sultan repeatedly to death.

The reality was that in 1389 the Serbs had been totally humiliated by the Ottomans. Whatever songs were sung about Obravitch, the humiliating defeat lived long in the memory. In effect, Milosevic was repeating, ‘Remember 1389, remember Kosovo’. Serbian nationalists were also Eastern Orthodox and their nationalism and religion were deeply intertwined. The 600th anniversary of the humiliating defeat at the Battle of the Blackbirds Field was in 1989, and Milosevic made full use of it. The result introduced new words to our vocabulary such as “ethnic cleansing”, in reality mass murder.

Milosevic invoked memory and commemoration for very violent purposes.

Was Milosevic really concerned with history or were his actions in relation to commemoration due to psychology? J. M. Roberts, the historian, has said: “It is only psychology which gives a special tone to centenary events” (Penguin History of Europe, p644).

A few years ago I was in Sarajevo presenting

a paper at a conference on Healing and Memory. I remember the visit well for two reasons.

Thanks to an Icelandic volcanic ash cloud and the closure of much of European airspace, I was stuck in Sarajevo. The other memory was on the afternoon cultural tour of the city, still bearing all the marks of devastation following the conflict of the early 1990s and some 30,000 dead. During a visit to a Serbian Orthodox Church, the priest was relating his story of the conflict when a three-way argument developed between the tour guide, the interpreter and the priest. We stood and listened to three different versions of the recent 1990s. Whatever the other Europeans made of it, I felt very much at home!

History, not only in Ireland but elsewhere, is always contested, no doubt because history is less about facts and always about interpretation.

The tendency is to read the past through the lens of the present and present needs. It may be the need to dominate the other, to establish one’s narrative as norm over the other, or to interpret history from the perspective of our current fears, anxieties and angst.

Commemoration may have more to do with the present than the past. In this sense it has more to do with psychology than with history.

If the word celebration is used of past events

5 The carnage of Flanders in the First World War

History, not only in Ireland but elsewhere, is always contested, no doubt because history is less about facts and always about interpretation

5 British armed forces at the annual Remembrance Sunday ceremony in Whitehall

in our history, then part of the Oxford English Dictionary’s definition is “to perform a religious ceremony”. This is why high commemorative events have a religious dimension, or a pseudoreligious dimension. The deity or god is directly invoked or the ceremony is highly ritualised, a solemn or sacred occasion with an underpinning spirituality. Especially if the commemorative event recalls war or violence, then it has to be invested with the highest moral authority. If people are being sent out to kill in war and conflict, and to be killed, then those in charge have

ap022-023.qxd

23/04/2014

10:29

Page 2

www.anphoblacht.com

May / Bealtaine 2014 23

EOIN Ó MURCHÚ Tá Fírinne na hÍoslainn Ró-Shearbh do RTÉ BÍONN an fhírinne searbh, mar deir an sean-fhocal, agus sampla maith de chruinneas an ráitis sin na scéal eacnamaíocht na hÍoslainne. Agus is fírinne í a rinne RTÉ a ndícheall a cheilt ar Prime Time ar na mallaibh.

5 President Higgins takes part in an Easter Rising commemoration alongside the Irish Defence Forces to invoke the highest moral authority. In the Western world, that is usually God (whatever we mean by ‘God’). Commemorations are often ritualised ceremonies, quasi-sacred occasions with a religious or pseudo-religious dimension.

Such religious or ritualised ceremony may need rigorous moral and ethical critique. It may indeed have more to do with psychology than history, memory, religious or moral reality.

The Decade of Centenaries, 1912-1922, opens up huge questions around commemoration, how we approach it and how we use memory.

It was a decade of violence as it was in the Balkans. Both the Balkans and Ireland were awash with guns and militarised politics. The middle part of the decade brought the framing event of all that happened in Ireland, the catastrophe of the Great War (1914-1918), which was sparked in Sarajevo in the Balkans. The decade will see a number of key commemorative events.

Will they be commemorative or celebratory?

How much will be about history or psychology?

And what do we do with all the guns, violence and industrialised killing?

We need to ask in Ireland, do we bring militarised mindsets to commemoration? Is there something of an obsession with militarism, a psychological obsession with things military and their trappings? And how much are psyches dominated by the pseudo-theology of blood sacrifice, or supreme sacrifice, central to Patrick Pearse’s view of the Easter Rising and the Ulster unionists’ interpretation of their slaughter at the Battle of the Somme?

It may be time to embrace a more critical commemoration, to acknowledge and unpick the psychology of our commemorative approaches. Uncritical commemoration may be an abuse of the past.

If we settle for selective memory and cherrypick our way through the events of 1912-1922, that will be an abuse of the past and an irresponsible way of dealing with history and memory. If we see our identity in one event more than another, or interpret a selected event to reinforce our imagined identity (and all identity is imagined!), that will be more about psychology than history.

Commemoration needs to bring to remembrance the good, the bad and the ugly. If com-

memoration becomes sectarianised, it will also be an abuse of the past.

So which narrative will we select, or will we be open to plurality and flexibility? There are not only many narratives, even of a single event, but there is flexibility required in the approach to them.

The discovery of letters or documents not seen before or an archaeological dig provides new perspectives and changes the narrative.

The interpretations of history are never static but always changing. Because psychological needs always change, this is the reason why a

If we settle for selective memory and cherry-pick our way through the events of 1912-1922, that will be an abuse of the past and an irresponsible way of dealing with history and memory

fiftieth anniversary can be very different from the centenary, and by the next milestone what is commemorated can and often does change again.

Will we move beyond selective heroes and can we acknowledge and honour the courage, bravery and compassion of many in war and conflict without glorifying war or violence, or believing in the causes that put them in the mud and blood of the trenches, or into action wherever?

Celebration is not appropriate for any event in Ireland’s decade or the Great War. We cannot celebrate death, violence and war. That is a culture of death and destruction. The alternative, and there always was an alternative, all the way through 1912-1922, is to cultivate a culture of life and human and environmental flourishing. As for all the violence in this decade or any other decade, if commemoration invites more violence or a return to violence, that will be an abuse of the past and memory. Can the commemorations become a counter-cultural moment?

Maraon le hEirinn bhí géarchéim bancaerachta ag an íosláinne a bhagair go scriosfadh sé an eacnamaíocht ar fad.

I gcás na hÉireann ar ndóigh thugamar déine isteach ar mhaithe le bancaeraí eachtrannacha a íoc, is cuma an dochar a dhein a leithéid don ghnáth-phobal. Támuid i gcónaí ag fulaingt dá bharr seo, is ce go mbíonn an rialtas ag geallúint arís is arís go bhfuil biseach ag teacht níl móran co0mharthaí dhe ar an talamh.

Rinne na húdaráis an rud céanna a dhéanamh san Íoslainn, ach bhí an pobal i dteideal reifreann a reachtáil ansin ar ábhair den chineál seo agus dhiúltaigh siad faoi dhó dó. Fágadh na bancaeraí ag crochadh.

Le cúpla bliain anois ta an íoslainn as an ngéarchéim, an fhaid is go bhfuil muide fós sa sáinn. Bhí an íoslainn in ndán dul ar ais go dtí na margaí airgeadais dhá bhliain sula ndeachaigh muide. Tá ráta fáis os cionn trí faoin gcéad acu le cupla bliain anuas, agus tá dí-fhostaíocht síos ag ceathair faoin gcéad, agus muid i gcónaí timpeall a deich.

Ach dá gcreidfeá RTÉ agus David Murphy ní réiteach firinneach ar bith é an réiteach Íoslannach. Bhí ar Íoslannaigh a gcuir saoire thar lear a chur ar ceal, dúirt sé; tá se róchostasach don ghnath-dhuine béile a fháil sna proinntithe is fearr agus tá na bainc eachtranna (i Sasana agus san Ísiltír).

Ar ndóigh tá na fadbanna céanna acu siúd in Éirinn nach bhfuil aon job acu, ach níor luaigh David Murphy é sin.

Deacracht eile don Íoslainn, dar le Murphy, ná go bhfuil na bainc eachtrannacha ar thóir a gcuid airgid i gcónaí.

Bhuel, dúirt an rialtas go n-íocfaí iad, ach I NDIAIDH fiacha an phobail a ghlanadh.

Agus céard is cearr leis sin?

Tá fadb ag an-chuid daoine san Íoslainn maidir lena gcuid morgáistí. Tá in Éirinn freisin ar ndóigh, ach tá rialtas na hÍoslainne ag úsaid airgead na tíre le cabhrú le daoine a bhfuil fadbanna mhorgaiste acu in ionad é a thabhairt dona bainc mar atá rialtas na hÉireann. Agus an fhaid is go raibh rialtas na hÉireann ag gearradh siar ar thacaíocht leasa shóisialaigh, san Íoslainn meadaíodh ar an líon slándála sin.

Arís ní raibh aon tagairt dó seo i dtuairisc Phrime Time.

5 Sigmundur Gunnlaugsson, príomhaire na hÍoslainne, nach dtuigeann cén fáth gur chuir rialtas na hÉireann leas na mbainc roimh leas an phobail Tacaíonn eacnamaithe cáiliúla le polasaí na hÍoslainne, pointe eile nár luaigh David Murphy. Mar shampla dúirt Josephy Stiglitz, a bhuaigh Duais Nobel Eacnamaíochta, go raibh “an ceart ag an Íoslainn. Ní bheadh sé ceart ualach na mbotún sa gcoras airgeadais a rinne roimhe a chur ar ghlúnta atá le teacht.”

Agus dúirt Paul Krugman go raibh se ciallmhar ag an Íoslainn na cainnteanais a chur ar na bainc a chuaigh ar mire in ionad iad a chur ar ghnáth-phobal.

Ar ndóigh sé an rud is tábhachtaí faoi seo ná gur éirigh leis an Íoslainn tíocht amach as an sáinn eacnamaíochta cupla bliain ó shoin, an fhaid is tá muide fós ag brath ar gheallúintí is féidireachtaí.

Ach níor thug tuairisc David Murphy mórán ama do rialtas na hÍoslainne an scéal a mhíniú. Ina ionad, rinne se caint i ndiaidh ciante le daoine a chreideann gur chóir don Íoslainn dul isteach san Aontas Eorpach agus a gcuid fiacha eachtrannacha a íoc (ar mhaithe leis na saoire thar lear, tá’s agat).

Níór luaigh Murphy gur theip go tubaisteach ar na páirtithe a mhol a leithéid sa toghchán le déanaí.

Ach ní iarracht a bhí sa gclár seo scéal na hÍoslainne a leiriú ach é a cheilt.

ap024-025.qxd

23/04/2014

10:33

Page 1

24 May / Bealtaine 2014

www.anphoblacht.com

The Spanish and French governments are part of the problem and therefore have to be directly involved in finding a solution to the conflict in the Basque Country

JIM GIBNEY

Spain should not squander arms gesture by ETA TWO recent stories from the Basque Country illustrate the stark difference between those in the Basque separatist movement seeking a comprehensive settlement based on peace and equality for the people of the Basque country and those in the Spanish Government seeking the defeat of ETA, the armed Basque grouping it was at war with for 40 years.

In February, an Amsterdam-based commission set up to monitor ETA’s two-year-old ceasefire released a video to the Spanish media which showed ETA members decommissioning weapons belonging to the armed organisation.

The commission is made up of six people from various backgrounds, including the former Minister for Defence in the South African Government and leading figure in the ANC, Ronnie Kasrils, as well as Chris McCabe, previously an adviser to the Northern Ireland Office. They issued a statement confirming and verifying the decommissioning.

The commission’s statement also said that the step by ETA is “significant and credible” and that “it will lead to the putting beyond operational use of all ETA’s arms, munitions and explosives”.

Former United States President Bill Clinton welcomed ETA’s initiative. Archbishop Desmond Tutu, who played a leading part in South Africa’s transition to democracy, welcomed ETA’s initiative. He described it as “brave” and an important “confidence building measure” which “opens the door to the possibility of lasting peace”. Tutu called on the Spanish Government and ETA to “intensify their work” to create the “conditions for sustainable harmony and reconciliation in the region”.

The Spanish Government reacted to this huge step by ETA by dismissing it as a “theatrical exercise”.

And while ETA was preparing the launch of its video showing its members decommissioning a tranche of its weapons, a 36-year-old Basque political prisoner, Arkaitz Bellon, was found dead in his prison cell.

Arkaitz Bellon’s death in solitary confinement took place in a prison several hundred miles from his home and family. He was due for release in May. An organisation campaigning for political prisoners, Etxerat, said that Bellon had been beaten while in prison between 2010 and 2013 and that the Madrid Government’s policy of holding prisoners in jails hundreds of miles from their families contributed to Bellon’s early death.

And while the autopsy report did not show signs of violence on Bellon’s body, the group Etxerat said, “The dispersion of prisoners, as well as causing added punishment for the prisoners and their families, makes possible attacks and tragic events [like Bellon’s death].”

The Spanish Government’s response to ETA’s ceasefire has been deliberately provocative and is designed to undermine the genuine efforts that Basque nationalists are making to move Basque society out of conflict.

And as other peace processes around the world have

Former leading ANC figure Ronnie Kasrils

US former President Bill Clinton 5 An ETA video from February showing an act of decommissioning

6 Basque POW Arkaitz Bellon died in custody

shown, including the Irish Peace Process, if you are part of the political problem then you have to be part of the political solution. And the Spanish Government and indeed the French Government are part of the problem and therefore have to be directly involved in finding a solution to the conflict in the Basque Country.

The key political issue which has fuelled the conflict from the 19th century has been the claim by Spain and France over the Basque Country.

The issue is a contest over national rights and inde-

Archbishop Desmond Tutu

pendence with the vast majority of the Basque people supporting parties pursuing political independence.

The armed conflict, which was primarily between ETA and the Spanish state, claimed the lives of nearly one thousand people and lasted for over 50 years, during which thousands of people were imprisoned.

So there should be no doubt in the minds of the Spanish and French governments that what they are facing is a political crisis based on the denial by them of democratic rights to the Basque people.

The decommissioning initiative by ETA is consistent with a series of developments involving Basque activists that are designed to create an atmosphere of peace and new thinking among those hitherto committed to using armed force.

These initiatives are also designed to encourage the Spanish Government to respond positively by taking confidence-building measures to encourage dialogue and peace in the region.

The treatment of political prisoners is a huge issue that the Spanish Government should have moved on long before now and should still.

There are hundreds of political prisoners in jail, many of them long distances from their families with many others ill.

The Spanish Government should move all long-distance prisoners to jails closer to their families with a view to releasing them as part of a negotiated settlement with Basque nationalists.

The Spanish Government should not squander the latest important arms gesture from ETA. With the French Government, they should be promoting dialogue, peace and reconciliation to end the current impasse.

ap024-025.qxd

23/04/2014

10:33

Page 2

We need to utilise the European Investment Bank

www.anphoblacht.com

OVER the last number of years, particularly following the economic collapse, government has imposed cuts across the board from child benefit to infrastructural investment. While many of these austerity cuts would not have, of themselves, qualified for assistance from the European Investment Bank (EIB) they could have been off-set if the Irish and Westminster governments had utilised the financial facilities provided by the EIB to proceed with the many infrastructure projects that were cancelled.

I am presently working with others to achieve a ¤1billion stimulus package for infrastructure projects in the North. There are huge opportunities in Europe for the drawdown of funding from the European Investment Bank.

But the first obstacle that we need to overcome is to get the ban lifted on the North’s Executive directly accessing EIB funds.

The construction industry was devastated by the economic collapse. If the Executive can be given direct access to this fund, rather than have to depend on a British Government initiative, and Dublin becomes

IN PICTURES

5 Gearing up for election: Sinn Féin's West Tyrone 60 Mile Cycle

May / Bealtaine 2014 25

This is funded by the European United Left/ Nordic Green Left (GUE/NGL)

Aontas Clé na hEorpa/Na Glasaigh Chlé Nordacha Crúpa Paliminta – Parlaimimt na h Eorpa

Another Europe is possible

The first obstacle that we need to overcome is to get the ban lifted on the North’s Executive directly accessing EIB funds

more proactive in drawing down this funding we can plan a strategic path back to economic recovery across this island.

Loan facilities through the EIB are the lowest available and are obtainable for major infrastructure and capital projects.

Through these long-term, low-interest

facilities we could proceed with projects such as the A5 Dublin/Derry dual carriageway, the A6 Belfast/Derry road, the Narrow Water Bridge and the Desertcreat Police and Fire Training College in County Tyrone, as well as a new Children’s Hospital. These cross-Border projects would serve to stimulate economic activity in the most disadvantaged areas of the island.

The EIB could also provide the funds for a much-needed capital build project for refurbishments and new-builds in the hospital and schools estates across the island.

Such an infusion of capital would put thousands of construction workers back to work, provide a lifeline for local SMEs (particularly in the service and hospitality sectors) and drastically reduce the unemployment registers. It would reduce benefit payments and increase tax revenue that would relieve the pressure on other sections of the economy such as health and education.

There is a better way! Austerity isn’t working! Stop the cuts and invest in job creation and economic recovery.

Martina Anderson MEP is a member of the GUE/NGL Group in the European Parliament

photos@anphoblacht.com

5 Sinn Féin’s Martin McGuinness meets with the South Africa Gaels GAA team during a visit to Stormont

ap026-027.qxd

23/04/2014

10:35

Page 1

26 May / Bealtaine 2014

www.anphoblacht.com

OUR LITERATURE AND ITS DEPICTION OF RURAL

IMAGINING

BY ROBERT ALLEN AN ENGLISH TRAVELLER, a sort of anthropologist, comes across a ‘curious scene’ in the midst of lonely mountains at the close of the day. He scratches his head, mystified.

“I could not help reflecting that these strong-bodied, though ill-clad, peasants might have found better employment on an evening admirably suited for ploughing.

“I noticed in a patch of bogland not far from the hut some ploughing gear lying haphazardly in a half-length of furrow, as if the peasant had flung it down on hearing a call to join the curious throng.

“Several peat-fires, which had been used apparently for the cooking of huge meals, had begun to die, but their relics still encircled the house and set it apart from the one or two others in the same district. The house itself, a miserable cabin, was crowded to the door with wild and picturesque figures.”

At the heart of this activity, the traveller is at

pains to explain a “huge gaunt man was reciting what was apparently a very violent poem in Gaelic”.

Unable to understand what is being spoken, the traveller turns to his ‘Hibernian’ companion for solace.

The lines he needs to know are translated.

“Till through my coffin-wood white blossoms start to grow “No grace I’ll beg from one of Cromwell’s crew.”

The poet is Eoghan Mor O’Donovan. He has heard that his family are to be evicted from their Gortinfliuch home but his wife Marie is pragmatic. “The poets will leave us in the end as desolate as we are now in this dawning.”

She asks her husband a question. “Have you thought of the days that will follow on the feasting?”

Eoghan Mor is ready with his answer.

“Woman, the sorrow that has made us desolate has this night given birth to a song that will live forever; because of it my name and your name and our son’s name, which are woven into its amhrán metre, will not pass.

Were I given my choice this moment to choose between Gortinfliuch and my song, to which would I reach my hand? This trouble that has come to our door is as nothing to the rapture in my song!”

WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS William Butler Yeats was apparently responsible for John Millington Synge’s presence on

the Aran islands between 1898 and 1901. “Go to Aran Mór,” Yeats told him in a Paris hotel in 1896. “Live there as if you were one of the people themselves; express a life that has never found literary expression.” Synge, who was more of a cultural than a political nationalist, needed the people of Aran more than they needed him.

Yeats, the Sandymount-born idealist, desired a modern Ireland that was rustic to the core. He promoted a Celtic renaissance that would preserve identity and folklore.

More crucially, it would give his own culture a crucial place in the new nationalist Ireland, which John McGahern acknowledged in 2001 when he put Yeats at the forefront of modern Irish literature.

“Yeats,’ said McGahern, “almost single handedly established a tradition that wasn’t there before. In fact, he paved the way for Joyce and Synge and you could say even [Samuel] Beckett.”

Synge, a pagan at heart, wanted the brutal truth, as much for himself as for any audience his writings might reach. His drama of the west, The Playboy of the Western World, upset a lot of people for its brutal realism.

Charles Kickham’s 1879 novel Knocknagow or The Homes of Tipperary had heralded a literary culture that would continue with Brinsley MacNamara, Seán O’Casey, Liam O’Flaherty, Frank O’Connor and Seán Ó Faoláin.

They would shatter the rustic image, only to reveal a hidden mirror.

When Kate O’Brien, Walter Macken, Edna O’Brien and John McGahern attempted to look in the mirror they realised it was doublesided. Their early novels, which appeared to expose the reality of a distinctly colonial and disturbingly heirarchical paradigm, were banned.

No one was allowed to imagine what the mirror reflected, least it shatter into thousands of tiny shards that would reveal our true nature.

THE VALLEY OF THE SQUINTING WINDOWS

There is a sense of rural sameness about Brinsley MacNamara’s The Valley of the Squinting Windows, published in 1918, and John McGahern’s That They May Face the Sun, published in 2000. McGahern’s mirror was never going to be shattered. In contrast, MacNamara knew his mirror would cause trouble. “When a country has made a long fight for freedom there is a feeling, pardonable enough, that it is in a sense traitorous to delve too deeply into the frailties of one’s own people. If a writer . . . believes that the best service he can do his country is to raise its selfrespect by attempting to lift it out of the dark realm of sham and cant and humbug by holding up the mirror truthfully, he is set upon from all sides as if he has committed a shocking crime.”

MacNamara did commit a crime. He took the romantic rustic imagery out of society.

The Valley of the Squinting Windows instead depicted a fascistic regime fuelled by pernicious gossip, malicious envy, and religious hypocrisy.

MacNamara had touched a raw nerve. It was one thing to clash with the new bourgeoisie, which MacNamara as a director of the Abbey Theatre managed to avoid; it was an entirely different thing to clash with the religious extremists and the social purists, who

ap026-027.qxd

23/04/2014

10:36

Page 2

www.anphoblacht.com

May / Bealtaine 2014 27

LIFE AND THE RUSTIC IMAGE OF THE COUNTRY

more than anyone in the new nation were not going to stand back and allow artistic freedom of expression, especially if it revealed a social truth.

Aran Mór born O’Flaherty imagined in his novels the mood and the language of the urban poor, with the empathy of an informed and acutely sympathetic outsider.

Born into the tenement streets of Dublin that O’Flaherty so vividly described in The Informer, O’Casey developed a literary voice that could not have been more authentic.

His grand trilogy of plays, The Shadow of a Gunman, Juno and the Paycock and The Plough and the Stars, are now seen as an integral aspect of the emerging nation’s literary tradition, but his rugged imagery and political awareness made him an enemy of Yeats.

Some would say that, with O’Casey’s exile, the authentic voice, the revolutionary voice, the peasant voice and many other voices went with him. Only four years after partial independence, a new battle began – for the ownership of the emerging nationalist culture, and it continues today.

Joyce in his day deplored the romanticism attached to rural Ireland, to the west specifically, to Aran in particular and perhaps unfairly to Synge, whose playboy has become an alluding image.

Modern Ireland’s image of itself is still defined by the work of Joyce, writing about Dublin, and Synge, writing about Aran, and their Irish worlds are long gone, but not forgotten, simply changed in a dramatically different way.

Joyce, more than any other Irish writer (including those whose literary reputations have remained intact into the 21st century: Patrick Kavanagh, Samuel Beckett and Flann O’Brien in particular) has come to represent the elitist literary tradition of modern Ireland, which was never his own intention.

Kavanagh has a special place in the hearts

IRELAND of the traditionalists. Beckett is understood by few while his characters have informed the lives and loves of the new bourgeoisie.

O’Brien is seen as the joker in the pack, but only by those who have attempted to understand him.

The Ireland of Joyce and Kavanagh and Beckett and O’Brien was once the place of all the people, with their cunning and guile, and wit and humour, and strategy and plan.

It was a complex place that, essentially, was about survival.

JORDAN, MORRISON, DOYLE AND McCOURT Neil Jordan, Danny Morrison, Roddy Doyle and Frank McCourt, with their brutally honest, Tarantino-like in-your-face snapshots of Irish society, shattered the stereotypical images of rural and urban Ireland.

Suddenly Ireland was a real place, no longer twisted and distorted into an arcadian place by adroit film-makers, revisionist scholars and prejudiced foreigners, it was the way it was, the way it looked in everyday life to everyday people.

Neil Jordan’s Ireland was a fairly ugly place.

It was violent, selfish and very modern.

Angel, his film about a love-sick gunman, had an idealistic edge to it but its underlying current was not a river flowing free, it was damned, damned to hell and it looked very familiar.

We’d never been there, not in films and not in books.

There was more to come.

Danny Morrison’s West Belfast was a fiction with a twist, politics as art, and it was celebrated and criticised as such. West Belfast the novel was as authentic as West Belfast the place.

Its theme, the loss of innocence, was autobiographical, its subject matter highly political, which, Morrison later recognised, was “usually the death knell of art”.

Nevertheless, he had touched a nerve that needed to be exposed. “Art,” he said some years after its publication, “sublimates, illuminates, enriches and celebrates life, [and] also protests against the wickedness of humankind and injustice.”

Morrison would revisit his roots to produce The Wrong Man, a modern version of The Informer, with many of the same themes, expressing the reality of street violence, revealing an Ireland that was already very real to many of its inhabitants.

When Roddy Doyle wrote The Commitments and film-maker Alan Parker saw something that he could turn into an authentic modern musical in 1991, it was as if the old Ireland and the new Ireland had morphed into something that everyone recognised and wanted to celebrate.

This was an Ireland everyone could relate to, even if it seemed slightly unreal. By the time Parker put McCourt’s autobiographical

sketch of 1940s Limerick lanes hardship on supersound widescreen just as the century was about to end, romantic Ireland disappeared up its own hole.

Rustic Ireland was revealed as a cruel hard place: repressed, lonely, sad, drunken, rainy, blustery and heartless.

But was it? Did Angela’s Ashes not represent an exile’s revisionist memory? Some people thought so. The radio phone-ins screamed with indignation when the people of Limerick realised what Frank McCourt had done to their city. It was as if they were saying, no we don’t want this reality, even if it is in the past, we want the romance we’re used to.

THE IMAGE OF THE PAST Now in the 21st century, with the hundredth anniversaries of 1916 and 1922 almost upon us, do we lament our past?

Of course we don’t.

Nothing has changed, just the props and the medium.

The image of the past is omnipresent in our future. What is more, we created this image ourselves and no amount of revisionism will change that.

“Must we Irish always be weaving fancy, living always in the fantastic world of a dream?” was the question Ó Faoláin asked in the closing sentences of his biography of Hugh O’Neill, whose imagined myth still mirrors the deep atavistic nature most of us carry in our breasts, leaving the foreign traveller to wonder why this windswept, rainsodden island means so much to those who inhabit it.

But Seán Ó Faoláin was wrong. Eoghan Mor O’Donovan was right.

Nothing compares to the rapture of our visionary imaginations.

ap028-029.qxd

23/04/2014

10:37

Page 1

28 May / Bealtaine 2014

www.anphoblacht.com

Fógraí Bháis

Jerry Savage

Noelle Ryan West Belfast 5 Fr Des Wilson supported by Elsie Best at Noelle Ryan’s funeral

DUBLIN-BORN Noelle Ryan, a stalwart of the West Belfast community, died on Saturday 29 March at the age of 81.

Paying tribute to Noelle, Sinn Féin President Gerry Adams TD highlighted the work she and her campaigning colleague and fellow champion of the people, Fr Des Wilson, carried out in Ballymurphy, one of the most socially disadvantaged areas of Ireland.

“Under Noelle and Fr Des’s guidance, Springhill House provided a meeting place for people to discuss and study whatever was of interest to them.

“Its objective was to promote social inclusion and self-help and to assist the most disadvantaged and prepare them for further education and training,” the former MP for west Belfast said.

In his homily during Requiem Mass for Noelle in Springhill’s Corpus Christi Church, Fr Des, in paying tribute to his close friend, echoed Adams’s words.

He said of Noelle: “Her great ambition was to help people to help themselves, hence her interest in education and health.”

Noelle Ryan came to live and work in west Belfast as the war on our streets intensified.

She arrived to help the people when many others were moving away.

She had spent six years in a convent in Drogheda before journeying to Liverpool and France but she never settled in those places, which was Belfast’s gain.

“Belfast was her second home,” said Fr Des. She worked with Fr Des in Springhill House and its education outreach programmes were so successful that in 1982 she and Fr Des extended its programmes into the Education floor of Conway Mill.

Thousands of people from across Belfast have passed through the doors of ‘The Mill’ on the road to educational success.

The success of the education programmes run out of Conway Mill also drew the atten-

5 Jerry at the 2004 Le Chéile event

Kerry

MARTIN FERRIS TD has paid tribute to veteran Kerry republican and Sinn Féin member Jerry Savage, who passed away on Saturday 22 March.

Deputy Ferris said Jerry’s contribution to the republican struggle over the decades was immense and that his passing would leave a huge void in the party in Kerry.

Jerry was the Munster Le Chéile honouree in 2004.

Deputy Ferris said: “Jerry Savage was a giant among republicans in Kerry. His commitment to the struggle for independence since the 1940s never wavered.”

In 1944, at just 17 years of age, Jerry joined the IRA. Only a few years later, he found himself with many others on the boat to England in 1949 in search of work. Upon his return to Ireland in 1954 to help with the family farm, Jerry also returned to the republican struggle. He was to the fore in reorganising the party following the split of 1969/70.

Martin Ferris added: “In later years, Jerry was an enthusiastic supporter of the Sinn Féin peace strategy which led to the signing of the Good Friday Agreement in 1998.

He also played a key role in successive local and Dáil elections including my Dáil election in 2002 and subsequent re-elections. He and another great Ballymac republican, the late Brendy Bonn, probably canvassed more doors than anyone during those elections.

“Jerry had a passion for all things Irish and was fluent in his native tongue. Of course, a lot of people will remember Jerry for his love of Kerry GAA. Jerry was a fine footballer himself with his beloved Ballymac. As a founding member of the Kerry Supporters’ Club it was rare that Jerry would ever miss a Kerry game and indeed he followed Kerry in both codes and at as many levels as he could.

“On behalf of Sinn Féin I want to extend my sincerest sympathies to Jerry’s wife Maureen; his sons Brendan, Brian and Kevin; and to his daughters Elizabeth and Carmel; and to all his extended family.

Henry K. Eckhart USA 5 Noelle Ryan at a Palestine solidarity protest at the US Consulate in Belfast, January 2009 tion of the British Government. As part of its policy of political vetting in the 1980s, the Belfast Education and Library Board withdrew its funding.

It is testament to Noelle, Fr Des, and many others, that the education carried out in ‘The Mill’ never ceased despite British attempts to stop them.

The large turn-out at her funeral, with hundreds included Sinn Féin politicians Gerry Kelly, Pat Sheehan, Paul Maskey and Belfast Mayor Máirtín Ó Muilleoir attending in a huge mark of respect to a pillar of the community.

BY PEADAR WHELAN

HENRY K. ECKHART, the father of Eric Eckhart, our colleague at An Phoblacht and Sinn Féin, died peacefully at the age of 90 at Hospice House in Huntington, West Virginia, USA, on Sunday 30 March.

Henry was a lifelong socialist and proud trade union member who believed strongly in the rights and empowerment of the working class.

After serving in the US Army in the Pacific in World War Two and decorated with a Bronze Star, he became a pacifist and antiimperialist campaigner.

A man of many quotes and one-liners, his proudest was: “Capitalism, by its very nature, is predatory and dehumanising.”

He was a gifted gardener, an able carpenter, an abstract painter and a sports enthusiast.

He was a dedicated and ever-present father who loved his children dearly and who was and will always remain a constant and inspiring figure in their lives.

He will be dearly missed by his loving wife of 62 years, Margarita, by his nine children and their spouses and by his 10 grandchildren and 11 great grandchildren.

ap028-029.qxd

23/04/2014

10:37

Page 2

www.anphoblacht.com

May / Bealtaine 2014 29

I nDíl Chuimhne

All notices and obituaries should be sent to notices@anphoblacht.com by Friday 16 May 2014

1 May 1993 Alan LUNDY, Sinn Féin.

2 May 1987 Volunteer Finbarr McKENNA, Belfast Brigade, 2nd Battalion.

3 May 1974: Volunteer Teddy CAMPBELL, Long Kesh.

5 May 1981: Volunteer Bobby SANDS, H-Block Martyrs.

5 May 1992: Volunteer Christy HARFORD, Dublin Brigade.

6 May 1988: Volunteer Hugh HEHIR, Clare Brigade.

7 May 1974: Volunteer Frederick LEONARD, Belfast Brigade, 3rd Battalion.

8 May 1987: Volunteer Declan ARTHURS, Volunteer Séamus DONNELLY, Volunteer Tony GORMLEY, Volunteer Eugene KELLY, Volunteer Paddy KELLY, Volunteer Jim LYNAGH, Volunteer Pádraig McKEARNEY, Volunteer Gerard O’CALLAGHAN, Tyrone Brigade.

10 May 1973 Volunteer Tony AHERN, Cork Brigade.

12 May 1981: Volunteer Francis HUGHES, H-Block Martyrs.

13 May 1972: Fian Michael MAGEE, Fianna Éireann.

13 May 1972: Volunteer John STARRS, Derry Brigade.

13 May 1973: Volunteer Kevin KILPATRICK, Tyrone Brigade.

13 May 1974: Volunteer Eugene MARTIN; Volunteer Seán McKEARNEY, Tyrone Brigade.

15 May 1971: Volunteer Billy REID, Belfast Brigade, 3rd Battalion.

16 May 1973: Volunteer Joseph McKENNA, Belfast Brigade, 2nd Battalion.

17 May 1973: Volunteer Thomas

O’DONNELL, GHQ Staff.

17 May 1976: Volunteer Jim GALLAGHER, Derry Brigade.

18 May 1973: Volunteer Seán McKEE, Belfast Brigade, 3rd Battalion.

18 May 1973: Volunteer Francis RICE, South Down Brigade.

21 May 1981: Volunteer Patsy O’HARA (INLA), Volunteer Raymond McCREESH, H-Block Martyrs.

21 May 1994: Volunteer Martin DOHERTY, Dublin Brigade.

24 May 1991: Eddie FULLERTON, Sinn Féin.

28 May 1972: Volunteer Martin ENGELEN, Volunteer Joseph FITZSIMMONS, Volunteer Edward McDONNELL, Volunteer Jackie McILHONE, Belfast Brigade, 3rd Battalion.

28 May 1981: Volunteer Charles MAGUIRE, Volunteer George McBREARTY, Derry Brigade.

31 May 1986: Volunteer Philip McFADDEN, Derry Brigade.

Always remembered by the Republican Movement.

CASEY, Gerard. In proud and loving memory of my dear husband Volunteer Gerard Casey, murdered on 4 April 1989. Gone are the days we used to share, but deep in my heart you will always be there. Always loved and remembered by wife Una. xxx CASEY, Gerard. In proud and loving memory of my dear father Volunteer Gerard Casey, murdered by pro-British thugs on 4 April 1989. Life springs from death and from the graves of patriot men and women spring living nations. Always remembered and

Comhbhrón ECKHART. Sincere sympathy is extended by all the staff at An Phoblacht and Sinn Féin Head Office to Eric Eckhart on the death of his father, Henry, on Sunday 30 March.

“LIFE SPRINGS FROM DEATH AND FROM THE GRAVES OF PATRIOT MEN AND WOMEN SPRING LIVING NATIONS.” PÁDRAIG Mac PIARAIS

never forgotten by son Paul, Noeleen and grandchildren.

CASEY, Gerard. In proud and loving memory of my dear father Volunteer Gerard Casey, murdered on 4 April 1989. Goodbyes are not forever, goodbyes are not the end, they simply mean we’ll miss you, until we meet again. Always remembered and never forgotten by son Kevin, Linda and grandson Conor.

CASEY, Gerard. In proud and loving memory of my dear father Volunteer Gerard Casey, murdered on 4 April 1989. A silent thought, a quiet prayer, for a special dad, in God’s care.

Always loved by daughter Geraldine, Gary and grandson Cillian. xxx CASEY, Gerard. In proud and loving memory of my father Volunteer Gerard Casey, murdered on 4 April 1989. To some you may be forgotten, to others part of the past, but to those who loved and lost you, your memory will always last. Always loved and remembered by Tara, Gerard and Katie. Xxx DOHERTY, Martin. In proud and loving memory of my brother Volunteer Martin ‘Doco’ Doherty, Dublin Brigade, Óglaigh na hÉireann, who was murdered at the Widow Scallan’s on 21 May 1994 by a pro-British death squad who set out to cause mass car-

nage and he died while saving so many lives. Proudly remembered by his loving brother Ben and Bernie.

DOHERTY, Martin. In proud and loving memory of our uncle Volunteer Martin Doherty, Dublin Brigade, Óglaigh na hÉireann, who was murdered at the Widow Scallan’s on 21 May 1994 by a UVF death squad intent on massacre. His selfless actions prevented many deaths.

Proudly remembered by his nephews Ciarán and Robert.

DOHERTY, Martin. In proud and loving memory of Volunteer Martin ‘Doco’ Doherty, Dublin Brigade, Óglaigh na hÉireann, who was killed by loyalists at the Widow Scallan’s pub on 21 May 1994. Think of him as living in the hearts of those he touched, for nothing loved is ever lost. Grieve not for him.

Speak not of sorrow. Although his eyes saw not his country’s glory, the service of his day shall make our tomorrow. From Ann and Caroline.

DOHERTY, Martin. In proud and loving memory of Volunteer Martin ‘Doco’ Doherty, Dublin Brigade, Óglaigh na hÉireann, who was killed by loyalists at the Widow Scallan’s pub on 21 May 1994. As near as a heartbeat, as close as a prayer, whenever we need you, you will always be there, you’re just a memory or part of the past, you’re ours to remember as long as life lasts.

Proudly remembered by his brother Ben, Bernie, Robert and Ciarán.

DOHERTY, Martin. In proud and loving memory of Volunteer Martin ‘Doco’ Doherty, Dublin Brigade, Óglaigh na hÉireann, who was killed by loyalists at the Widow Scallan’s pub on 21 May

» Notices All notices should be sent to: notices@anphoblacht.com at least 14 days in advance of publication date. There is no charge for I nDíl Chuimhne, Comhbhrón etc.

IN PICTURES

1994. Not a day goes by when your name isn't mentioned or you photo looked at. Forever in our hearts, an inspiration and a hero. Always remembered never forgotten. Love Natalie, Nizzy, Cillian and Ellie xox DOHERTY, Martin. In proud and loving memory of Volunteer Martin ‘Doco’ Doherty, Dublin Brigade, Óglaigh na hÉireann, who was killed by loyalists at the Widow Scallan’s pub on 21 May 1994. Always remembered by the Nesbitt and McCabe-McLean families, Glasgow.

DOHERTY, Martin. In proud and loving memory of Volunteer Martin ‘Doco’ Doherty, Dublin Brigade, Óglaigh na hÉireann, who was killed by loyalists at the Widow Scallan’s pub on 21 May 1994. "You're gone, you're gone, but you live on, in my memory".

Remembered with pride by the members of the Rising Phoenix RFB Baile Átha Cliath and the Vol. Martin 'Doco' Doherty RFB Glasgow.

KELLY, Jimmy. In proud and loving memory of Volunteer Jimmy Kelly, South Derry Brigade, Óglaigh na hÉireann, murdered by British dead squads on 25 March 1993. We think about you often and talk about you still. Always remembered by your father, brother and sisters.

KELLY, Jimmy. In proud and loving memory of Volunteer Jimmy Kelly, South Derry Brigade, Óglaigh na hÉireann, murdered by British death squads on 25 March 1993. We think about you often and talk about you still. Always remembered by the McPeake Family, Tullyheron, Maghera.

» Imeachtaí There is a charge of €10 for inserts printed in our Imeachtaí/Events column. You can also get a small or large box advert. Contact: sales@anphoblacht.com for details.

photos@anphoblacht.com

5 A commemoration in Rasharkin, Antrim, marks the 25th anniversary of the killing of IRA Volunteer Gerard Casey 5 A horse-drawn carriage at the funeral of ‘Big Jim’ O’Reilly, West Belfast. A former POW, Jim died on Sunday 23 March. The cortege was made up of Jim’s family including his partner Marguerite, daughter Theresa, republican former POWS, friends and comrades of the big man and senior republicans Gerry Kelly MLA, Sue Ramsey MLA, Seán Murray, West Belfast MP Paul Maskey, Bobby Storey, Brendan ‘Bik’ McFarlane and Pat Sheehan MLA. Other comrades of Jim’s from the H-Blocks travelled to Belfast from across the North, indicating the esteem in which he was held. Jim was cremated at Roselawn Crematorium.

ap030-031.qxd

23/04/2014

10:39

Page 1

BETWEEN THE POSTS

30 May / Bealtaine 2014

THE

www.anphoblacht.com

BY CIARÁN KEARNEY

LINING OUT FOR THE DARK SIDE AS COUNTIES across Ireland put the finishing touches to their championship preparations, 2014 is already raising new questions about our national games.

The premier competition in schools’ Gaelic football is the Hogan Cup. This year, the finalists were St Patrick’s Maghera from County Derry and Pobalscoil Chorca Duibhne from County Kerry. The Kerry college won in the end by two points in what was a mostly sporting encounter in Croke Park.

However, the real talking point of the game was the description used

by Radio Kerry to describe the Ulster champions from County “Londonderry”.

A small editorial error, some may think.

Six years ago, my eldest daughter joined other children from Irishmedium schools across Belfast to play a friendly game against their Gaelscoil counterparts from Dublin.

The annual event is played as part of a challenge match in each code: boys’ and girls’ Gaelic, hurling and Camogie. This particular year was no different and had the added attraction of being staged in Casement Park. However, as the girls game got underway, my attention was drawn away from the pitch to the Dublin schoolchildren cheering on teammates. “You’ll never beat the Irish!” they sang.

Attitudes are learned and enculturated within the GAA over many years. It is not restricted to school teams either. During one of last summer’s televised games, RTÉ commentator and former Defence Forces army officer Kevin McStay described Cork as Ireland’s “second city” (his ‘tours of duty’ never brought him as far as Belfast, it seems).

Bias towards players appears to be worse than fans.

Last year, Tyrone star Seán Cavanagh was publicly flogged for an unforgettable and unacceptable foul. Later in the same competition, Dublin were eulogised as a team with the Midas touch: their management genius; their extensive, multidisciplinary backroom team; their limitless financial resources; their canny decision-making and their massive panel. No mention of the ugly last quarter of the championship final where the boys in blue shamelessly hauled their Mayo counterparts to the ground.

Now we face into the 2014 cham-

fused referees as well. When Armagh lost to Donegal, the Orchard County manager, Paul Grimley, was outspoken: “We talk about black cards . . . about giving respect, and the elephant in the room is the refereeing.”

Donegal’s Colm McFadden was more content: “It was a tough game with a lot of pulling and dragging but I suppose from our point of view that’s what we want at this time of year.” McFadden’s candour about Donegal’s comfort on playing with the rules, rather than with the ball, is enough to test any referee’s consistency.

Oddly enough, the closing stages of the National League provided some foresight of what may be to

5 Derry’s management accused the Mayo team of a pattern of fouling against Enda Lynn pionship and referees are equipped with the black card. The signs so far are not good. When Dublin travelled north to meet Derry in Division 1 of the National Football League, the only person to get a black card was one of the Oak Leaf team. This was despite the fact that TG4 footage showed the boys in blue throwing punches with closed fists at their Derry opponents. Dublin full-back

Philly MacMahon had such fast hands he was able to land two punches to the back of his opponent’s head before their feet touched the ground. The Derry player was taken off with concussion. The Dublin man stayed on – until he got caught out later in the match.

A couple of weeks later, the Dubs played Tyrone. The outcome paved

Dublin’s way into the 2014 National League Final. However, the match stats were more interesting for the display by the referee. One black card was shown – to a Tyrone player. In the first 35 minutes, Dublin got four yellow cards. No black card was shown to anyone wearing blue that day.

Perhaps Dublin are not to blame.

Maybe the change in rules has con-

5 Dublin's Jason McCarthy armlocks Tyrone’s Collie Cavanagh and forward Kevin McManamon necks Mattie Donnelly

‘We talk about black cards . . . about giving respect, and the elephant in the room is the refereeing’ come. At half-time in their Croke Park contest against Mayo, Derry’s management spotted a pattern of fouling against their players: “A lot of people are questioning what is this black card . . . Enda Lynn had been fouled personally 12 or 13 times in the first half . . . He received a number of personal fouls. The number of times Kevin Johnston was going through and was taken out and nothing was given.”

To say Derry players were personally targeted by their opponents seems unreal. Yet there were other signs that day of this phenomenon.

Even the Oak Leaf analysts didn’t see the members of the Donegal backroom team sitting in Croke Park. Each one held a mini-camera and iPad trained on one of three Derry players involved in the Mayo match. Those intent on bringing the dark side of sport into gaelic games haven’t been deterred by black cards. For the sake of player safety, let’s hope match officials start catching on.

ap030-031.qxd

23/04/2014

10:40

Page 2

www.anphoblacht.com

May / Bealtaine 2014 31

‘This is a rights issue; this is the nuts and bolts of equality’

Sinn Féin minister shows the way with Casement Park social clauses

BY PEADAR WHELAN MINISTER CARÁL NÍ CHUILÍN has outlined the social clauses imposed by her Department of Culture, Arts and Leisure (DCAL) on employers vying for contracts to build the new multi-million pound Casement Park stadium in west Belfast.

Ní Chuilín made her announcement on Tuesday 2 April at an event in the North’s only second-level Irish-language college, Coláiste Feirste, when she cut the first sod for the school’s state-of-the-art sports centre.

In a challenge to other Executive departments and officials she said that “for too many years now, Government departments and officials worked on the basis that things can’t be done. I instructed my officials that this must be done.

“At the very least, this approach takes the equality agenda into new territory for a Government department in the North of Ireland.

“It also imposes new conditions on the private sector around the promotion of equality.”

She stressed: “This is a minimum baseline rather than a maximum ceiling but, as the late Inez McCormack, who helped build the foundation for this equality approach, used to say, an inch down the right road is always progress.”

Speaking to An Phoblacht, Carál Ní Chuilín promised almost 120 new jobs and training opportunities for Belfast’s most socially disadvantaged areas as a central plank of the Stormont Executive’s stadium construction programme.

The £76million Casement Park develop-

Carál Ní Chuilín with Sinn Féin politicians Niall Ó Donnghaile and Pat Sheehan, Pat’s daughter Banba and handballers Aisling Reilly and Jordan Ó Néill and funders

Red letter day for Coláiste Feirste DCAL Minister Ní Chuilín cut the first sod of the planned multi-sports complex for the North’s only Irish-language college.

The minister was joined by a number of Sinn Féin’s elected representatives from across Belfast who she commended for the huge efforts they have made on behalf of the school.

The headline project is the first of a num-

ber of projects to be developed as part of expanding the Gaeltacht Quarter in West Belfast.

As well as DCAL, Belfast City Council and Sport NI are supporting An Charraig Mhór, which will see state-of-the-art handball courts included in the school’s sports facility, which is to be built on the site of the old Beechmount Leisure Centre.

ment has met with opposition from residents living near the GAA venue.

However, the minister’s announcement demonstrates Sinn Féin’s commitment to local communities blighted by unemployment and inequality.

The Sinn Féin minister said: “Social clauses are the legal outworking of the equality agenda.

“We need to constantly try and find practical ways to turn aspirations into actions and that’s exactly what we have tried to do with social clauses in the stadium programme.”

The stadium programme includes the redevelopment of the other main stadia in Belfast at Windsor Park and Ravenhill.

A number of DCAL’s social clauses include the targeting and ring-fencing job opportunities for the long-term unemployed (those not working for more than 12 months) as well as ring-fencing opportunities for apprenticeships.

Conformation and monitoring that a contractor is endeavouring to achieve accreditation under the living wage foundation and enhanced environmental targets to reduce the contractor’s energy and carbon footprints.

“We have also included the requirement that contractors deliver five practical proposals for community initiatives to ensure social returns and benefits for the local community,” added Ní Chuilín.

Also present for the announcement was West Belfast MP Paul Maskey.

Welcoming the news, he said: “We have rightly challenged the decades of neglect suffered by the people of this area.

“So it is great to see a Sinn Féin minister funding a project of this magnitude and ensuring through the social clauses that local people benefit from it”.

World Cup summer of discontent AS BRAZIL gears up for the World Cup, they may be about to witness a reprise of last year’s mass protests against austerity that coincided with Brazil hosting the Confederations Cup. That competition was seen as a rehearsal for this summer’s World Cup and, in general, Brazil was felt to have come through the test with flying colours. However, the new round of protests threatens to undermine that.

The Workers’ Party Government are clearly terrified that the protests will escalate and the response to a protest by around 1,500 in Sao Paulo on 15 April was to arrest 54 people.

It seems extraordinary that the most successful soccer nation on the planet (the only country to have reached the last stage in all 20 tournaments since 1930; contesting seven finals and winning five)

MATT TREACY

should be the scene of such opposition to the holding of the competition.

The protesters contrast the amount being spent on the World Cup by the state (including $15billion on new stadiums alone) with cuts to public provision.

Last year, the protests targeted matches, and shots fired by the police could be heard during TV coverage of the Nigeria v Tahiti game. 120,000 people protested in Belo Horizonte on the day Brazil played Uruguay in the semi-final, and there were violent clashes in Rio the day Brazil beat Spain in the final.

The stakes are far higher this summer. The attention of the world will be on Brazil, with wall to wall coverage of everything that happens around match venues, in contrast to the relative lack of interest in the Confederations Cup outside

5 A mass protests against austerity in Brazil last year of Latin America at least. So it will be interesting to see if the protests gather strength.

Let us hope too that the rustic

opponents of electricity do not turn up at Croke Park in September on the days Dublin capture Liam and Sam!

ap032-001.qxd

23/04/2014

10:03

Page 1

anphoblacht NEXT ISSUE OUT – Thursday 29th May 2014 32

ANGLO IRISH BANK

First bankers convicted

BY MARK MOLONEY

THE IRISH PUBLIC are still waiting for justice to be served on those culpabale for the Irish banking crisis, Sinn Féin’s Pearse Doherty said after Anglo Irish Bank former CEO Seán FitzPatrick was cleared of all charges of permitting unlawful financial assistance to the so-called ‘Maple 10’ or ‘Golden Circle’ group of investors and members of businessman Seán Quinn’s family to buy shares in the bank.

Anglo executive Pat Whelan

FitzPatrick’s co-accussed, Pat Whelan and William McAteer, were found guilty after a 43day trial in Dublin of giving out illegal loans to the Maple 10 group of property developers. The pair will be sentenced on 28 April (after we go to press) and face up to five years in prison. They too were cleared of allowing illegal loans to members of the Quinn family.

The two became the first bankers in Ireland convicted of giving illegal loans. The

‘Maple 10’ borrowed Ř450million from Anglo Irish Bank to purchase Anglo shares in what is believed to have been an attempt to reduce Seán Quinn’s holding in the bank and to help artificially protect the bank’s falling share price.

Reacting to the ruling, Sinn Féin Finance spokesperson Pearse Doherty TD said there would be mixed emotions to the verdict: “Though Judge Nolan quite correctly pointed out that these men were facing technical charges and weren’t answering for the problems of the entire banking system, many people just saw this as a trial of the former bankers who contributed to the crash.”

Pearse Doherty hit out at the failures in Irish banks, regulators and the reckless loans availed of by developers, combined with the policies of Fianna Fáil, for causing great long-term economic suffering for the Irish people.

“Austerity budgets, unsustainable debt to GDP level, emigration, poverty, unemployment and repossessions have been the sentence handed out to ordinary people,” the Sinn Féin TD said.

‘Many people just saw this as a trial of the bankers who contributed to the crash’

Anglo Irish Bank’s William McAteer