An Phoblacht, June 2017

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EQUALIT Y | RIGHTS | UNIT Y

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2 June / Meitheamh 2017

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Westminster campaign counts down to voting on 8 June

Probably the most important election of a lifetime

BY MICHAEL McMONAGLE THE Westminster election is just weeks away and campaigning is well underway across the North as Sinn Féin looks to get the highest number of votes possible.

As expected, given the timing and motivation of British Prime Minister Theresa May in calling the election, Brexit has been the main theme of campaigning.

While Theresa May, the Tories and their DUP unionist allies are seeking a mandate to push through their Brexit agenda, Sinn Féin has made it clear to voters that this election is an opportunity to send a clear message against Brexit, against Tory cuts and for Irish unity.

The election campaign may have been slower to start in the North than in Britain but there is no doubt that it is now in full flight with posters on lamp-posts in cities, towns and villages across the North and canvass teams knocking on doors, seeking the all-important votes.

The issue of electoral pacts dominated the early stages of the campaign as the possibility of unionist pacts was the main topic of discussion.

Given the historic election performance of Sinn Féin in the Assembly election in March and the

Make a stand for equality and Irish unity – reject Brexit ending of the unionist majority at Stormont for the first time since partition, attention turned to whether the DUP and Ulster Unionist Party would stand aside for each other or field agreed candidates in key constituencies to prevent Sinn Féin winning more seats.

Despite the fact that no formal pact was agreed between the unionist parties, the UUP unilaterally agreed not to stand candidates in West Belfast, Foyle and North Belfast.

The move effectively gives the DUP’s Nigel Dodds an easier run in North Belfast.

Sinn Féin entered into discussions with the SDLP, Green Party, Alliance and others about the possibility of securing arrangements which would allow the anti-Brexit, pro-equality vote to be maximised in constituencies but no agreement could be reached.

Following the announcement by Sinn Féin that John Finucane, son of murdered Belfast human rights lawyer Pat Finucane, would be the party’s candidate in North Belfast, Sinn Féin called on the SDLP to stand aside in the constituency, as well as in Fermanagh & South Tyrone, where Michelle Gildernew is the only serious challenger to sitting Ulster Unionist MP Tom Elliott.

The Sinn Féin party leader in the North, Michelle O’Neill, reaffirmed that Sinn Féin is the only anti-Brexit, pro-equality party capable of winning those seats but her call was rejected by the SDLP, who put forward low-profile spoiler candidates in each constituency who may cost valuable votes.

5 Foyle candidate Elisha McCallion on the campaign trail with young republicans at Free Derry Corner

claiming she was being complimentary only served to draw more attention to the original remarks and reignite the debate around ‘everyday sexism’ and arrogance in public life.

SDLP leader Colum Eastwood followed Arlene Foster’s ill-advised media style when he needlessly plunged himself and the SDLP into another contro-

During the Assembly election campaign earlier this year, DUP leader Arlene Foster breathed life into the election when she made her now-infamous “crocodile” comments, angering nationalists and republicans and driving more and more people to polling stations.

The DUP leader would have been well advised to stay away from the media during this campaign given her performance in the last but she clearly did not take any notice and she has weighed in with some more controversy this time around.

In what should have been a soft-focus profile piece in the anti-republican Sunday Independent in Dublin, Arlene Foster managed to embroil herself in an almighty sexism row when she used the word ‘blonde’ to describe Michelle O’Neill.

Her attempts to get herself out of the mess by

‘Westminster should not be allowed to dictate our political future’ versy when the DUP leader said she was concerned about the increase in the number of people applying for postal and proxy votes (a mechanism encouraged on social media by the House of Commons itself!).

Seemingly oblivious of the fact that Brexit and continued DUP arrogance has resonated with voters, instead Colum Eastwood appeared to suggest that something untoward was happening and that the SDLP were not “orchestrating” it.

Those comments did not go down well with the wider nationalist community, however, particularly in areas such as Derry where memories of unionist gerrymandering are still fresh in many

memories of the Civil Rights struggle during unionist domination.

While Brexit dominates the political landscape, issues around rights and respect are also major electoral issues, particularly around the Irish language.

On Saturday 20 May, tens of thousands, including large numbers of young people, took to the streets of Belfast in a colourful demonstration through the city centre to add their voices to calls for an Irish Language Act. Sinn Féin representatives once more joined the protesters and were featured prominently in the news coverage.

As the campaign moved into its final phase, Sinn Féin launched its manifesto in Dungannon, in the key election battleground of Fermanagh & South Tyrone, where Michelle Gildernew is hoping to win back the historic seat from Ulster Unionist Tom Elliott, a former soldier in the Ulster Defence Regiment.

At the manifesto launch, Michelle O’Neill made it clear that this election is the most important for a lifetime and that the political stakes have never been higher.

She was joined at the launch by fellow Sinn Féin candidates Chris Hazzard MLA (South Down) and Elisha McCallion MLA (Foyle), who explained the

5 Sinn Féin representatives from across Ireland line out for An Lá Dearg in Belfast on Saturday 20 May when thousands demonstrated their support for an Irish Language Act

June / Meitheamh 2017

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3

5 Sinn Féin launches its manifesto in Dungannon, County Tyrone

“That what we stand for is rights, equality and Irish unity.”

Michelle O’Neill said the election is part of a political fighback against Brexit, the Tory cuts agenda and the arrogance of the DUP. “The recent Assembly election has activated a transformation unimaginable to the founders of the Northern state.

“We must keep the momentum going and to make our voices heard and our anger felt by the spineless British Tory Government in London.”

content of the manifesto to the media.

Sinn Féin’s case for the North to have ‘Designated Special Status Within the EU’ features prominently in the manifesto.

Speaking at the launch, Michelle O’Neill called on people to use the election to send a clear message to Theresa May’s Tories at Westminster and the DUP that they are opposed to Brexit.

Outlining the importance of each and every vote at this election, Michelle O’Neill said: “Often we say when an election occurs that this one is really the most critical. But we honestly cannot understate the huge importance of this one.

This election gives people an opportunity to show they reject the Brexit agenda of the Tories and their allies in the DUP “The political stakes are high. This is probably the most important election of a lifetime.”

The Sinn Féin leader in the North also said it affords people an opportunity to reject the Brexit agenda of the Tories and their allies in the DUP. “This election is also of such importance because it was called by British Prime Minister Theresa May in the narrow self-interests of the Tory Party who have no regard whatsoever for the people of the North, our interests or our future – and who are intent on dragging us out of the EU despite the fact that the majority of the people here voted to 'Remain' in June of last year.

“So, this is very much an opportunity to tell both the Tories and the DUP again – in the strongest possible terms – that we reject Brexit; reject the Border; reject any attempt to put limits on our freedom of movement; reject barriers to agriculture and trade.

“And that we absolutely reject Tory cuts.

5 Fantastic four: Mairéad O'Donnell, Elisha McCallion, Michelle Gildernew and Jacqui Russell

5 Sinn Féin's Michelle O'Neill takes questions from the media

5 A walk in the park for Sinn Féin candidates Máirtín Ó Muilleoir, Chris Hazzard, Michelle O'Neill, Elisha McCallion and John Finucane

‘We must keep the momentum going, make our voices heard and our anger felt by the spineless British Tory Government in London’ She also told voters that Brexit and the continued growth of Sinn Féin has created a new political arena in Ireland.

“I have no doubt that this will be another ground-breaking election for Sinn Féin.

“The old certainties are gone and a new political era is opening up in Irish politics.

“Brexit and Tory cuts demonstrate the undemocratic nature of partition.

“Westminster should not be allowed to dictate our political future.

“So we must not let them.

“Irish unity is now firmly on the agenda and rights and equality have been put centre-stage of the political process.

“The choice for voters is clear – vote for parties that will sit on the side of the Tories and their cuts and for Brexit or with us in Sinn Féin to safeguard their rights, agreements, prosperity and our future in the EU with the rest of Ireland and who are anti-Brexit.”

4 June / Meitheamh 2017

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anphoblacht Editorial

WHAT'S INSIDE 8

National Hunger Strike Commemoration for Mayo in August 10 & 11

Fighting for the heart and soul of Belfast’s Market community 12

Collusion was not an illusion – Martina Anderson MEP 18 & 19

anphoblacht Eagarfhocal

anphoblacht

Maintain the momentum – Vote Sinn Féin NEXT YEAR is the 50th anniversary of the start of the Civil Rights movement in the Six Counties, a peaceful protest movement that was battered off the streets by the ‘Orange State’ and its police ruled by the Unionist Party from Stormont before it split into the Democratic Unionist Party and the Ulster Unionist Party.

One key demand of the Civil Rights movement was for all citizens to have the democratic right to vote and for that vote to be respected.

Voting in the Westminster election is part of the political fightback against unionism trying to reassert its dominance and bring about a return to unionism ruling the roost with everyone else outside the DUP and UUP knowing their place.

People’s rights are under assault from the unionist parties and their political cousins in the Conservative & Unionist Party at Westminster.

The Theresa Mays and Boris Johnsons dictating to us from London don’t care about people in Ireland, North or South – certainly not nationalists and not even those who identify as unionist.

We have to fight back against the reckless and dangerous policies of the self-serving Tory Government, run by a party made up of England's wealthy, privileged elite and which is hell-bent on forcing a disastrous Brexit on the North and imposing an EU frontier across Ireland.

Contact

Britain’s ‘Dirty War’ behind death of Brendan O’Callaghan

NEWS editor@anphoblacht.com NOTICES notices@anphoblacht.com PHOTOS photos@anphoblacht.com EAST ANTRIM

24 & 25

Standing up for Irish fishing – Liadh Ní Riada MEP

Layout and production: Mark Dawson production@anphoblacht.com

Oliver McMullan

EAST BELFAST

Mairéad O’Donnell

EAST DERRY

Dermot Nicholl

Everyone knows Brexit will have a damaging impact on our business, trade, agri-food, tourism and other sectors of the economy with the imposition of trade tariffs, a 'hard' Border and denying people the freedom of movement, North and South.

It will undermine the progress of the past 20 years, including the Good Friday Agreement and subsequent agreements.

The people of the North don’t want Brexit. The people across Ireland do not want a frontier across our island.

It is unacceptable.

They don’t want Tory cuts. They are unacceptable.

They will not tolerate inequality and discrimination, nor second-class citizenship for anyone – women, LGBT, Irish-speakers, ethnic minorities, or equality and trade union activists.

Sinn Féin wants a different type of European Union.

We want a social Europe which promotes peace, demilitarisation, economic and social justice, international solidarity, respects sovereignty and with greater democratic accountability.

The people want fairness and equality – in society, in government and across the EU They want Irish unity.

Your vote can make this happen.

That is the message we need to deliver at the Westminster election on June 8.

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 contact the Editor first.

An Phoblacht, Kevin Barry House, 44 Parnell Square, Dublin 1, Ireland Telephone: (+353 1) 872 6 100. Email: editor@anphoblacht.com

www.anphoblacht.com FERMANAGH/SOUTH TYRONE

Michelle Gildernew

FOYLE

Elisha McCallion

LAGAN VALLEY

Jacqueline Russell

MID ULSTER

Francie Molloy

30

Arlene, Leo and who’s Saudi now?

31

Film review NEWRY/ARMAGH

Mickey Brady

Pointless Journey, the ‘road movie’ about Ian Paisley and Martin McGuinness SUBSCRIBE ONLINE To get your An Phoblacht delivered direct to your mobile device or computer for just €10 per 12 issues and access to the historic The Irish Volunteer newspaperand An Phoblacht’s/IRIS the republican magazine archives

STRANGFORD

Carole Murphy

NORTH ANTRIM

Cara McShane

UPPER BANN

John O'Dowd

NORTH BELFAST

John Finucane

WEST BELFAST

Paul Maskey

NORTH DOWN

Therese McCartney

WEST TYRONE

Barry McElduff

SOUTH ANTRIM

Declan Kearney

SOUTH BELFAST

Máirtín Ó Muilleoir

SOUTH DOWN

Chris Hazzard

Sinn Féin Candidates for the June 8th Westminster Election

June / Meitheamh 2017

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5

SDLP attacks on abstentionism miss the point

Does Claire Hanna think she’s a better Irishwoman than Constance Markievicz?

BY JOE DWYER THE BBC Newsnight round-table discussion between the North’s main parties on Tuesday 17 May demonstrated that the SDLP hierarchy would sooner see pro-Brexit, pro-austerity, pro-partition, unionist MPs take their seat in the House of Commons than see Irish republicans elected by people who voted for them on an openly abstentionist platform.

Around the debate table were Westminster candidates John O’Dowd (Sinn Féin, Upper Bann), Jeffrey Donaldson (DUP, Lagan Valley) and Naomi Long (Alliance, East Belfast). Steve Aiken represented the Ulster Unionist Party and Claire Hanna the SDLP. Kirsty Wark was in the chair.

When John O’Dowd raised the DUP’s receipt of a £425,000 ‘dark money’ from the mysterious ‘Constitutional Research Council’ during the Brexit Referendum, the DUP’s Jeffrey Donaldson didn’t give an answer. Before Wark could pursue the point, the SDLP’s Claire Hanna helped ‘Sir Jeffrey’ out by chipping in: “This is the sort of distraction that we get.”

Claire Hanna was more interested in attacking Sinn Féin for its longstanding abstentionist policy from the Westminster Parliament than putting the pro-Brexit DUP on the spot.

Asked by Kirsty Wark about Sinn Féin’s position on abstentionism, John O’Dowd obliged. The SDLP spokesperson sneered though: “Does John think he’s a better Irishman than Davitt or Parnell or O’Connell or other people who found it in themselves to represent their people?

Are you a better nationalist than the SNP and Plaid Cymru?”

How the Scottish National Party and Plaid represent their voters is their business. Claire Hanna slipped up, however, in citing the Repeal Movement or Irish Parliamentary Party to have a

5 SDLP's Claire Hanna fails to grasp what Sinn Féin MPs have always been about

dig at Sinn Féin’s abstentionism. Sinn Féin’s antecedence resides in the radical republican tradition in Ireland.

Any cursory reading shows that Daniel O’Connell was no republican. In an open letter to the people of Ireland, he declared: “Let our allegiance to the amiable and exalted personage

The SDLP rep was more interested in attacking Sinn Féin than putting the proBrexit DUP on the spot who wears the crown of these realms be as affectionate as it ever shall be unbroken.”

In fact, in order to join the Repeal Association, one had to take an oath of allegiance to the British monarch.

Sinn Féin takes more stock from the radical Young Irelander Movement and its leaders.

In 1843, William Smith O’Brien stated he would not attend Westminster again, writing to a colleague: “It is not my intention to beg any more from the British legislature . . . I am persuaded that our voice will be much more potent when reinforced by the public opinion of Ireland than it would be if spoken in the House of Commons.”

As for Parnell, Davitt and the rest of the Irish Parliamentary Party, it is clear that – even with over 40 years operating inside the Westminster system, even with a sizeable number of MPs, and even when holding the balance of power and acting as kingmaker in shoring up the British Government’s majority – they still failed to secure their stated aim of Home Rule! How long were the Irish people expected to wait?

5 House of Commons and (right) Sinn Féin abstentionist MP Constance Markievicz

During the height of Parnellism, the Irish Parliamentary Party filibustered, obfuscated and breached procedure to see Home Rule secured. In our own time, SDLP MPs sign Early Day Motions saluting the bravery of the British military in Afghanistan (Mark Durkan, 23 February 2009) or expressing delight at the burial of King Richard III (Alasdair McDonnell, 18 March 2015).

It can hardly be said that the SDLP are taking the fight to ‘The Belly of the Beast’.

There have always been those advocating withdrawal.

Michael Davitt himself argued privately within the Irish Parliamentary Party that they should withdraw and form an assembly in Dublin of Irish MPs. Parnell would regularly threaten to withdraw from the “Saxon Parliament”.

In Michael Davitt’s last contribution

5 The SDLP is preoccupied with attacking Sinn Féin rather than holding the DUP to account

to the House, in October 1899, he lamented at his own attendance: "When I go I shall tell my boys, ‘I have been some five years in this House, and the conclusion with which I leave it is that no cause, however just, will find

‘Do they really believe that the battle for Ireland’s rights is to be fought out on the floor of the House of Commons?’

JOHN DEVOY

support, no wrong, however pressing or apparent will find redress here, unless backed up by force.’ This is the message which I shall take back from this assembly to my sons."

John Devoy (whom Pearse called “the greatest of the Fenians”) put it succinctly in 1877, asking about the Irish Parliamentary Party: “Do they really believe that the battle for Ireland’s rights is to be fought out on the floor of the House of Commons?”

The SDLP may well ask if Sinn Féin MPs consider themselves better than Davitt, Parnell or O’Connell.

Do the SDLP Westminster candidates consider themselves better nationalists than the likes of Count Plunkett and Michael Collins?

Does Claire Hanna think she’s a better Irishwoman than Constance Markievicz?

6 June / Meitheamh 2017

www.anphoblacht.com

McGrory to step down as North’s Director of Public Prosecutions Sri Lanka’s massacres of Tamils marked on 18 May, ‘Mullivaikkal Remembrance Day’

BY PEADAR WHELAN TAMIL EXILES were in Belfast and Derry on 18 May for ‘Mullivaikkal Remembrance Day’, marking the anniversary of the bloody massacres carried out by the Sri Lankan Army in May 2009 as it crushed the Tamil struggle for an independent homeland, slaughtering as many as 70,000 Tamils, mostly civilians.

Mullivaikkal Remembrance Day takes its name from a village on the north-east coast of Sri Lanka which was the scene of the final action of the conflict on 18 May 2009.

The Sri Lankan Government celebrates 18 May as ‘Victory Day’.

Sri Lanka (formerly Ceylon) gained its independence from Britain in 1948 but the Tamil minority was marginalised and politically disenfranchised by the larger Sinhalese population, fuelling the campaign for a separate state called Tamil Eelam in the northern and eastern parts of the island.

Headline-grabbing armed resistance to the Sri Lankan regime came mainly in the form of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), popularly known as the Tamil Tigers.

The bloodbath was carried out by the Sinhalese-dominated Sri Lankan military as it pursued the total destruction of the Tamil Tigers.

The huge Sri Lankan military offensive also ruthlessly targeted Tamil

civilians sheltering in an area declared a “Free Fire Zone” and led to former UN spokesperson Gordon Weiss accusing the Sri Lankan Government and its armed forces of war crimes.

Channel 4 has also produced a number of exposés, including (by Jon Snow) Sri Lanka’s Killing Fields, which Channel 4 describes as “a forensic investigation into the final weeks of the Sri Lankan civil war, including new video evidence of war crimes”.

A spokesperson for the Tamil group visiting Belfast and Derry, Jude Lal Fernando (who, incidentally, is Sinhalese), told An Phoblacht “Just as loyalism served to internalise British interests within Ireland, Sinhala supremacism was groomed by the British to assist their colonial control of the Indian subcontinent.”

The Dublin-based activist explained how after the ‘shoot-to-kill’ ambushes by the paramilitary Royal Ulster Constabulary in County Armagh in 1982, Sri Lanka set up its own police commando unit with British help. The Sri Lankan Special Task Force (STF) was trained by SAS veterans.

Among those hosting the Tamil group were Sinn Féin, the National Graves Association, Coiste na nIarchmimí, the human rights campaign groups Relatives for Justice (RFJ) and Pat Finucane Centre (PFC), the Irish Forum for Peace in Sri Lanka, and the International Human Rights Association-Bremen.

BY PEADAR WHELAN THE surprise announcement by Barra McGrory that he is to step down as the North's Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP)in September, after almost six years in the justice hot seat, comes in the midst of a hyped-up campaign by unionists and the right-wing media over his department’s decision to press charges against British ex-soldiers over the killings of nationalist civilians in the North.

McGrory refuted suggestions that he bowed to pressure from these parties. Sources say his decision was not connected to the recent attacks on himself and his office, adding that he intends to return to private parctice.

Unionists and their Tory and media allies have consistently attacked McGrory since his elevation to the job in November 2011. Much of their

ire comes from the fact in his private law practice he represented senior republicans over the years, including Sinn Féin leaders Gerry Adams and the late Martin McGuinness.

Unionists and their Tory and media allies have consistently attacked McGrory since his elevation to the job of DPP in November 2011 However, more recently with the DPP pursuing cases against British ex-soldiers for killing nationalists in the North, former military personnel have launched a campaign calling

for immunity from prosecution for state forces involved in conflict-related killings.

Reacting to the news on behalf of Sinn Féin, the party spokesperson on justice and legacy issues, Gerry Kelly, accused the unionists and the DUP’s Jeffrey Donaldson of hypocrisy, saying it was their campaign the undermine McGrory and his office that made him a “controversial” figure.

Kelly cited figures that destroyed claims by Donaldson and other unionists of DPP bias against the British service personnel.

According to Kelly, of 17 legacy cases since McGrory took office, eight have focused on republican killings, three on loyalist and three on British soldiers.

The real reason for unionist anger, many suspect is that, as McGrory was the first Catholic to be promoted to the office of DPP, many unionists ‘didn’t want a Catholic about the place’.

5 Neal Rush and Mark McLoughlin call for marriage equality with a mock gay wedding on the steps of Stormont with (below) Sinn Féin guests led by Elisha McCallion, Paul Maskey and Mairéad O'Donnell

5 Tamil group spokesperson Jude Lal Fernando

June / Meitheamh 2017

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7

The end for Enda but crises in housing, health and the Garda go on

New Taoiseach, same old Fine Gael outsourced failure to his ministers but adopted and cuddled any success as his own.”

It was a theme also taken up by Sinn Féin deputy leader Mary Lou McDonald TD who, speaking on the floor of the Dáil on the day his resignation as leader of Fine Gael took effect, said: “The truth is that he has been a very bad Taoiseach for ordinary people.

He is a Taoiseach who has implemented policies which benefited the most-well-off in society to the detriment of everyone else.

“In 2011, Deputy Kenny came to power with the largest majority in the history of the state and, to great fanfare, he promised a democratic revolution.

BY MARK MOLONEY MAY was a month in Leinster House that saw an enormous shift in the political landscape with the resignation of Enda Kenny as leader of Fine Gael and as Taoiseach from the beginning of June.

Since then, the media coverage has been dominated with fawning Fine Gael backbenchers and outpourings of reverence from political commentators who really should know better.

Much of the commentary of newspaper editors, CEOs, bankers and admirers of Fine Gael’s politics is decidedly at odds with public opinion.

Two days before Enda Kenny’s announcement, the Simon Commu-

Much of the commentary of newspaper editors, CEOs, bankers and admirers of Fine Gael’s politics is decidedly at odds with public opinion

5 The Long Goodbye: Enda Kenny with the ministers scrapping to replace him not just as leader of Fine Gael but as Taoiseach

serious issues about the questionable use of taxpayers' money in the Garda budget, including the transfer of €100,000 from the Garda Training College to the private Garda Boat Club.

Another report in a Sunday newspaper revealed how An Garda Síochána tapped the phone of an opposition party worker. This particular activist was based in a constituency where he rivaled an important Government minister. An Phoblacht understands that it is highly probable that the person whose phone was bugged is a Sinn Féin activist.

The swirling controversies were summed up by Sinn Féin leader Gerry Adams. He noted that it has been “crisis and chaos” that has dominated Kenny’s reign as Taoiseach.

One of the best rebuttals to the fawning over Enda Kenny’s time in office came from satirist and impressionist Oliver Callan (Scrap Saturday and Callan’s Kicks), who hit out at journalists within the political bubble in Leinster House for becoming “teary-eyed at moments like these that their vision is splintered into emotional memories and fond anecdotes for radio panels”.

His sobering analysis of a man he described as “The Accidental Taoiseach” was more incisive and accurate than much of the unctuous praise from more mainstream hacks.

“The truth is he had a majority so large he could have achieved anything but chose to squander a chance that may not fall into the hands of one person quite so spectacularly ever again,” Callan wrote in the Irish Times.

“Kenny’s Ireland today is a haven for tax avoiders, vultures, the unaccountable and cronyism. He was a details dodger, someone who shrewdly

nities held a meeting with TDs and senators at Buswells Hotel where they outlined how the increasing gap between Housing Assistance Payments and the spiraling costs of rent meant that many people are simply being forced into homelessness. Of course, the Fine Gael/Independent Government will be keen to ignore this issue and, indeed, I couldn’t see any Government representatives at the briefing.

Another ‘crowning glory’ for the departing Enda in May came with the announcement that hospital waiting lists hit a record high of 666,000. He will not like to be reminded of the 2007 general election when Fine Gael slammed Fianna Fáil for allowing the numbers to hit 29,000.

To top it all off, we saw yet more scandals erode public confidence in An Garda Síochána. Questions were being asked of Commissioner Nóirín O’Sullivan after an internal audit raised 5 The Garda College at Templemore – channeling taxpayers' money to the Garda Boat Club

‘Kenny’s Ireland today is a haven for tax avoiders, vultures, the unaccountable and cronyism’ OLIVER CALLAN

However, what he actually delivered during his six years as Taoiseach was crisis after crisis.”

This analysis didn’t go down well with the serried ranks of the Blueshirts who shouted and screamed from the Government benches with a level of outrage that had previously only been seen when it was suggested that the Dáil bar should be closed during votes.

The two contenders for Enda Kenny’s job wasted little time in getting their campaigns off the ground.

Such has been the focus on faction fighting and declarations of support for the contenders to be Kenny’s successor – Social Protection Minister Leo Varadkar and Housing Minister Simon Coveney – Fine Gael were so dizzy they forgot to vote during a motion on the sale of AIB shares, much to the bemusement of Opposition TDs. Summing up the possible outcome from the Fine Gael leadership contest, Mary Lou McDonald said the new Taoiseach will either be “the Great Demoniser of the Unemployed and Poor – Leo Varadkar” or “the Minister for Chronic Homelessness and Hotel Rooms – Simon Coveney”.

Plus ça change.

8 June / Meitheamh 2017

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MAYO TO HONOUR THE HUNGER STRIKERS THE 1981 Hunger Strike was a pivotal moment in Irish history which saw republican political prisoners thwart British Government efforts to criminalise the struggle for a free and united Ireland.

Spreag crógacht na Stailceoirí Ocrais daoine ar fud na cruinne a bhfuil dúil sa tsaoirse acu.

Anseo in Éirinn is faoi bhród a chuimhníonn poblachtánaithe ar n-íobairt agus ar a ngaisce.

Gach bliain, déanann poblachtánaithe ó gach cearn d’Éirinn agus ó thar lear comóradh ar íobair deichniúr fear óga a fuair bás sna H-Blocanna sa Cheis Fhada sa bhliain 1981.

We remember also the sacrifices

“CELEBRATE THEIR LIVES”

of Frank Stagg and Michael Gaughan who died on hunger strike in England.

It is fitting therefore that this year’s commemoration will be held in Michael's and Frank’s home county of Mayo.

This year’s commemoration will remember also those republicans of earlier generations who died on hunger strike, including Seán McNeela (also from Mayo) and Tony D’arcy from neighbouring County Galway.

MAYO has a long and proud Three Mayo republicans died republican history stretching on hunger strike for the rights back to the 1798 Rebellion of political prisoners. led by the United Irishmen.

They were Seán 'Jack' Mayo man and Fenian McNeela, who died on Michael Davitt led the 19 April 1940 in Arbour Land League, which was Hill Military Detention Barracks, Dublin, after founded in Castlebar in 1879, and won back the land 55 days on hunger strike; for the people from the Michael Gaughan, landlords and stoped MICHAEL DAVITT who died on 3 June, evictions.

1974, after 64 days on Mayo played a very significant role hunger strike in Parkhurst Prison, in the Tan War, with several notable England; and Frank Stagg, who died ambushes of British forces, and subse- on 12 February 1976 after 62 days quently played a part in the Civil War. without food.

IMEACHTAÍ COMÓRTHA SATURDAY 3rd JUNE

GERRY ADAMS TD

“AM cinniúnach i stair na hÉireann an Stailc Ocrais.

“The 1981 Hunger Strike saw the men and women in the H-Blocks of Long kesh and Armagh Women’s Prison – and the tens of thousands who supported them – thwart British Government efforts to criminalise the struggle for a free and united Ireland.

“The bravery of Bobby and Francie, Raymond, Patsy, Joe, Martin, Kevin, Kieran, Tom and Mickey has inspired freedom-loving people across the globe.

“Is le bród mór a chuimhníonn poblachtanaigh ar an chrógacht agus an íobairt a léirigh siad uilig.

“Every year, republicans from across Ireland and abroad commemorate the sacrifice of the ten young men who died in the H-Blocks in 1981.

Stair Phoblachtánach Mhaigh Eo

Leigue Cemetery, Ballina 2pm Wreath-laying ceremony marking 43rd anniversary of the death of Michael Gaughan.

MESSAGE FROM SENATOR ROSE CONWAY WALSH

Cranmore, Sligo 2pm-7pm Hunger Strike Exhibition

SATURDAY 8th JULY

Main speaker: Senator Rose Conway Walsh

Glasshouse Hotel, Sligo, 11am-4.30pm Hunger Strike Exhibition

SUNDAY 4th JUNE

SUNDAY 9th JULY

Westport Town Hall 1pm-7pm Art and Hunger Strike Exhibition

“Tá an cion céanna againn ar íobairt Frank Stagg agus Michael Gaughan a thug a mbeatha ar stailc ocrais i Sasana.

“It is fitting that this year’s commemoration will be held in Michael's and Frank’s home county of Mayo.

“At this year’s commemoration we will also remember those republicans of earlier generations who died on hunger strike, including Seán McNeela, also from Mayo, and Tony D’arcy from neighbouring Co Galway.

These freedom fighters – these political prisoners – were all about the future.

This is an opportunity to remember them all and to celebrate their lives.”

FRIDAY 7th JULY

6pm Guest speaker: Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin TD Exhibition open to public from 1pm

FRIDAY 23rd JUNE

Charlestown Arts Centre 8pm Hunger Strike Exhibition

Guest speaker: Owen Carron, former election agent for Bobby Sands MP

FRIDAY 30th JUNE

Ballina Arts Centre 8pm Screening of '66 Days'

(Film about Bobby Sands’s hunger strike) Guest speaker: Former Hunger Striker Raymond McCartney MLA

Easkey, Co Sligo 2pm-7pm Hunger Strike Exhibition

FRIDAY 14th JULY

Castlebar Library 8.30pm 'Women in Struggle' Exhibition

Former political prisoner Síle Darragh will read an extract from her book John Lennon is Dead, followed by a talk with both Síle and Cllr Mary Clarke on women’s resistance and the legacy of the 1981 Hunger Strikes.

FRIDAY 21st JULY

Aras Inis Gluaire, Belmullet 8pm Screening of '66 Days'

“I AM DELIGHTED that Mayo will host the 2017 National Hunger Strike Commemoration.

“Mayo saw three of its own young men – Seán McNeela, Michael Gaughan and Frank Stagg – die on hunger strike for their republican

SATURDAY 22nd JULY

Ballaghaderreen Library, Co Roscommon, 12-6pm Hunger Strike Exhibition & Lecture about William Patrick Partridge

By Prof Conor McNamara, GMIT. Afterwards a procession will leave Ballaghaderreen Square leading to Partridge’s grave to mark the 100th anniversary of his death.

SATURDAY 29th JULY

Raddison Hotel Galway City, 6pm Galway Remembers the Hunger Strikers Talk and Presentations

This event will be followed with music by Rebel Hearts @ 9pm.

Tickets available @ €15 each.

FRIDAY 11th AUGUST

Great National Hotel, Ballina 8pm Panel Discussion featuring

Ruán O’Donnell on the hunger strikes of Seán McNeela, Tony D’Arcy, Michael Gaughan and Frank Stagg. Plus Danny Morrison on the 1980/81 Hunger Strikes and a former woman political prisoner on the Armagh Jail struggle 1980/81.

SATURDAY 12th AUGUST Great National Hotel Ballina 'Colonialism and Conflict' workshop 10am-4pm

Facilitated by Trademark Belfast

Evening discussion 8pm Including former H-Block prisoner and Palestinian speaker Organised by Sinn Féin Republican Youth

Function featuring Spirit of Freedom @ 9.30pm

SUNDAY 13th AUGUST Ballina 3pm National Hunger Strike Commemoration

Main speaker Gerry Kelly MLA plus many award-winning bands

RADIO DOCUMENTARY Erris FM will be broadcast Liamy McNally’s three-part

radio documentary Dying for the Cause – The Story of the Mayo Hunger Strikers

on FRIDAY 21st JULY, FRIDAY 28th JULY, and FRIDAY 4th AUGUST.

Other Mayo radio stations will replay the documentary in the run-up to the national commemoration.

beliefs and for the rights of political prisoners.

“Mayo will honour their sacrifice and those of the men who died in Long Kesh in 1981, as well as the memory of Galway man Tony D’arcy, with dignity and pride.”

June / Meitheamh 2017

www.anphoblacht.com

9

Teastaíonn feachtas nua chun na h-ionaid mídhaonna do theifigh a dhúnadh

Caithfear Deireadh a Chur leis an tSoláthar Díreach Le Trevor Ó Clochartaigh

strainséar singil ag roinnt seomra lena cheile.

Is minic go mbíonn fadhbanna idirphearsanta, sláinte agus meabharghalair ag baint leis na daoine seo. Níl aon spás phearsanta ag na daoine seo, rud atá mícheart amach is amach.

Is iad Sinn Féin an páirtí is mó atá taréis seasamh láidir a thógáil i gcoinne an chóras uafásach seo, ach caithfidh muid géarú ar an bhfeachtas. Níl aon amhras orm ach go mbeidh binse fiosruithe nó iniúchadh stáit ann amach anseo maidir leis an gcaoi a bhfuiltear

IS IN OLCAS atá cursaí gaibhte sna h-ionaid Soláthar Díreach (Direct Provision) in Éireann, seachas í bhfeabhas, ó foilsíodh tuarascáil McMahon agus gur cuireadh an tAcht Cosanta Idirnáisiúnta i bhfeidhm. Tá gá díriú anois arís ar an mhí-úsáid institiúideach seo agus caithfear dul i mbun feachtais arís chun deireadh a chur leis ar fad.

Is mar bheartas shealadach a tugadh isteach na h-ionaid Soláthar Díreach sa tír seo sa bhliain 2000, chun cóiríocht a chur ar fáil do dhaoine a thagann go hÉireann ag lorg tearmann faoin dlí idirnáisiúnta. Seacht mbliana déag ina dhiaidh sin tá fós 4500 duine ag conaí, páistí a dtrian, i 35 ionad timpeall na tíre, i gcoinníollacha atá ag sárú bunchearta daonna agus dínit an duine.

Is iad Fianna Fáíl a chum agus a cheap an córas uafásach seo. Lean Fianna Fáil agus an Lucht Oibre leis. Is sean-óstáin, ionaid saoire, foirgintí eaglasta agus eile den chuid is mó atá in usáid mar ionaid Sholáthar Dhíreach. Comhlachtai príobháideacha den chuid is mó atá iontu. Tá cuid de na comhlachtaí i ndiaidh na milliúin euro a shaoradh as cruatan na ndaoine bochta seo agus tá ceisteanna ollmhóra le freagairt faoin gcóras tairisceana agus iniúchóireachta ar an gcaiteachas stáit seo.

Is beag scil ná oiliúnt atá ag na daoine atá i mbun na h-ionaid ó thaobh seirbhísí tacaíochta do na teifigh, saineolas chomhairleoireachta, sláinte agus mar sin de.

Nuair a thagann na teifigh go hÉireann ar dtús

IN PICTURES

is iondúil go gcuirtear iad chuig ionad faoi leith i mBaile Seisceann sula scaiptear iad ar fud na tire.

Ní béarla an máthair theanga ag a bhformhór agus bíonn dúshláin go leor acu de bharr gur bh’éigean dóibh teitheadh ó chogadh, ciapadh nó cos ar bholg de chineál éigin.

Bíonn an Rialtas, Fianna Fáil agus an Lucht Oibre ag iarraidh rá gurb í an fhadhb is measa ná an mhoill ag deileáil le h-iarratais ar thearmainn agus thugadar isteach próiséas nua iarratais aon-uaire le sin a mhaolú. Ach, tá an chóras sin níos claonta i gcoinne na dteifeach ná an leagan amach amscaoi a bhí ann go dti seo.

Cuireadh ceistneoir casta, fada, i dtoll a chéile do na h-iarrthóirí. Bhí na h-aistriúcháin lofa in go leor teangacha. Tá easpa aistritheoirí feiliúnacha ar fáil agus níl na seirbhísí chomhairle dlí thar mholadh beirte go minic ach an oiread. Úsáidtear an chaipéis seo mar bhunús d’iarrthóirí ar

thearmann. Gan amhras, déantar botúin agus dá bhrí sin déantar éagóir.

Ach, is fadhb mór millteach ann féin iad na h-ionaid Soláthar Dhíreach féin. Is ciapadh institiúideach atá ar bun nach féidir a chosaint. Is minic go gcuirtear i gcomparáid iad le príosúin oscailte, ach go mbíonn fhios ag duine i gcás daoradh den chineál sin cén uair a bheidh deire leis an téarma.

Is minic go mbíonn teaghlaigh iomlána ag roinnt seomra nó dhó in ionad phlúchta. Níl deis gnáth shaoil teaghlaigh a chaitheamh, ar nós cócaireacht a dhéanamh, béile a chaitheamh le chéile nó ócáidí clainne ar nós laethanta breithe a cheiliúradh agus cuairteoirí a bheith acu. Bíonn páistí brúite ó thaobh spás spraoi agus staidéar agus ní bhíonn príobháideacht ar bith ag lánúnacha pósta.

I gcásanna faoi leith, bíonn suas le ceathrar

Is minic go gcuirtear i gcomparáid iad le príosúin oscailte, ach go mbíonn fhios ag duine i gcás daoradh den chineál sin cén uair a bheidh deire leis an téarma ag caitheamh leis na teifigh seo.

Is dóigh gurb é an rud is mó a chuireann as dom faoi seo ar fad ná gur daoine iontach cumasach atá ann, nach bhfuil ag iarraidh a bheith mar ualach ar an stát, ach go bhfuil siad teanntaithe ag an gcóras nach dtugann cearta chun oibre, ná cearta oideachais dóibh ach an oiread, mar nach bhfuil Éireann ag seasamh leis na dualgais cearta daonna idirnáisiúnta atá againn.

Caithfidh muid ar fad seasamh le cheile i ndlúthpháirtíocht leis na daoine seo. Caithfidh muid dúshlán na bpáirtithe bunaidh a thabhairt.

Caithfidh muid comhbhá muintir na hÉireann a chothú. Caithfidh muid deire a chuir le Soláthar Díreach.

photos@anphoblacht.com

5 Dublin/Monaghan Bombings 43rd Anniversary – Flowers are laid at the memorial in Talbot Street, Dublin, to those who died in attacks claimed by the Ulster Volunteer Force with British agents on 17 May 1974

5 Republicans in Belfast mark the anniversary of Bobby Sands's death on hunger strike in the H-Blocks of Long Kesh on 5 May 1981 and show solidarity with the mass hunger strike by Palestinian prisoners

10 June / Meitheamh 2017

www.anphoblacht.com

THE LEGACY OF GERARD ‘JOCK’ DAVISON AND THE AMBITION OF BELFAST’S MARKET DEVELOPMENT ASSOCIATION

Fighting for the heart and soul of their community ENTHUSED by the legacy and commitment of Gerard ‘Big Jock’ Davison, the Market Development Association (MDA) has embraced many of the projects that Davison championed as the MDA Regeneration Manager before he was shot dead by a gunman in May 2015.

A CHAMPION INSPIRED BY BOBBY SANDS

GERARD DAVISON was a socialist republican whose aspirations for his community saw him oppose the military and economic repression of that community. Inspired by his hero IRA Volunteer Bobby Sands’s dictum that everyone, young or old, has their part to play, Davison acted as a role model for many.

These include the young activists in the area whose projects such as the Market Social Education Project has seen them establish a weekly book club focusing on such subjects as political economy. During May they had workshops discussing the ‘The Village Against the World’, the tale of Marinaleda, a village in Spain that has pursued co-operative programmes aimed at benefiting the whole community.

There’s also the Pangur Bán project, established in 2014, which promotes independent learning, communal solidarity and social pride through lectures, debates, concerts and drama.

Last year, the Centenary of the 1916 Easter Rising, they packed out the Waterfront Hall with a community-based play about the revolution in Dublin.

Travellers’ rights activist and TV/ movie actor John Connors (Love Hate, King of the Travellers, and more) spoke to a packed hall about his life as a Traveller, an activist and a republican.

This is truly part of the legacy of Gerard ‘Jock’ Davison, a revolutionary community activist who led from the front.

On the second anniversary of Davison’s death An Phoblacht’s PEADAR WHELAN travelled to the Market area and met with members of the MDA and spoke to them about the man they see as “a hero, a defender of the area and an advocate for our community”.

TOO OFTEN when we read about or see news broadcasts reporting on small inner city areas of Belfast, Dublin, Derry, Cork or Limerick, the content is negative and disheartening.

Depressingly, the bad news tends to overshadow the positive acts of community action and resistance that, in a lot of instances, is the glue that holds these districts together.

This still stands true as we look back to the news headlines of two years ago after a lone gunman ambushed and killed Gerard ‘Jock’ Davison in the Market area of Belfast in May 2015.

Davison, a larger-than-life character, a committed republican and community activist, was gunned down at the junction of Lower Stanfield Street and Welsh Street as he walked to work in the Market Development Association (MDA).

The MDA is an organisation that he put his heart and soul into as he fought to revive an area that was devastated by the war that raged in the North and the effects of deindustrialisation that impoverished a once-thriving community.

The mainstream media, in time-honoured fashion, vilified Davison and focused on his previous republican links and involvement in the IRA to present him as the villain of the piece rather than the victim. Indeed, their underlying message was to effectively say ‘he got what he deserved’.

As the lone gunman who killed ‘Jock’ took away his life, the press sought to take away his character and standing by linking him, without a shred of evidence, to numerous killings.

If it holds true that bad news dominates the news agenda when reporting inner city areas, it is equally true that there are plenty of people engaged in a massive amount of work motivated by a true community spirit.

Day in, day out, there is activity created, developed and sustained by individuals and groups inspired to rise above the mire of state indifference and in opposition to greedy developers and industrialists who only value people for their labour and whose goal is profit and self-aggrandisement

THE MARKET AT WAR For many people, particularly in the North, the Market in south Belfast, which adjoins Belfast City Centre, was synonymous with legendary ‘Official IRA’ leader Joe McCann, who was shot dead by British Army paratroopers in May 1972.

McCann’s celebrated status grew in the aftermath of the internment raids of 9 August 1971, when British troops invaded nationalist areas of the North and dragged hundreds of republicans off to internment camps, provoking some of the worst clashes of the conflict between nationalists and British forces.

5 Sinn Féin Councillor Deirdre Hargey with her brother, Fionntán, pointing out how the British military dictated the street plans as part of their strategy to control the population

On 10 August, a group of six Official IRA members, led by McCann, took over Inglis’s Eliza Street bakery in the Market area. In the fierce gun battle that ensued, McCann’s unit pinned down a large contingent of British soldiers.

The epic photograph of McCann taken

during the gun battle, of him silhouetted in the flames of a blazing van as he crouched with an M1 carbine and a Starry Plough flag fluttering above him, reinforced his status as a guerrilla fighter and reflected the spirit of resistance in the Market areThe Market, as with many nationalist

June / Meitheamh 2017

www.anphoblacht.com

5 Sinn Féin MLA Máirtín Ó Muilleoir discusses Dan Hancox's book as part of the MDA's Social Education Project on Spanish village Marinaleda and its efforts to build a social economy

5 Naoise Ó Cuilín (Mairéad Farrell Republican Youth) at the talk on 'The Village Against the World'

11

5 Travellers' rights activist and actor John Connors with Dublin historian Lorcan Collins at the mural painted in tribute to Volunteer Charlie Monahan (Charlie was born in the Market), who died on Good Friday 1916 as he travelled to guide Roger Casement ashore with the weapons from 'The Aud'

investment and development around it. Lanyon Place witnessed the construction of the Waterfront Hall, Hilton Hotel and the BT Tower but the local community continued to be marginalised and excluded.”

Hargey slammed those behind the redevelopment who boasted how they walled up the East Bridge Street tunnels to ‘make sure they didn’t come over from the Market to steal cars’.

Hargey said: “Against the grain of our earlier history as part of the city’s commercial life, redevelopment was being used as an excuse to criminalise and squeeze our people out of Belfast’s economic life.”

It is these tunnels, a signature project of the MDA under Gerard Davison as he fought to break the stranglehold that developers and planners have on the area, which are a priority for the MDA as they continue his work.

PLANS TO DEVELOP

5 Ex-prisoner and now Belfast City Councillor Séanna Walsh of Coiste na nIarchimí addresses republican ex-POWs and their families in the Market Community Centre as part the MDA's community engagement programme

enclaves throughout the North, experienced the wrath of the British military and their Royal Ulster Constabulary allies in the course of the war.

Needless to say, the area was also subjected to unionist terror with death squads carrying out the wishes of their British puppet masters and targeting residents.

The clear links between the British state forces and unionist killers was obvious in the assassination of Brendan ‘Big Ruby’ Davison when, in 1988, Ulster Volunteer Force gunmen disguised as RUC policemen lured the veteran IRA Volunteer to open his front door in Friendly Way, where they shot and killed him. The murdered man was ‘Jock’ Davison’s uncle.

The Davisons, like many others in the district with a republican tradition, became active in the IRA as the war intensified across the North and ‘The People’s Army’ fought back.

In a paper delivered as part of the Market Social Education Project, Fionntán Hargey of the MDA gave a snapshot of life in the area and outlined how a veteran of the time described life in the late 1960s and early 1970s as the old certainties of unionist domination were shaken to their foundations.

“In the Market they even started a co-operative shop. It sold food and household stuff; sold everything at cost price.

“Some things were bought wholesale, some things ‘fell of the back of a lorry’. Big Joe McCann

would say: ‘It’s not stealing, it’s commandeering.’

“The shop ran for a number of years, into the 1970s, but the Brits continually came in and wrecked it. Then internment came and all the men were gone – locked up. The shop struggled to run anymore. The Brits killed it off.”

Another veteran of the time told Hargey: “Even with all these defeats and setbacks, things had changed. All along it was empowering.

“Despite all of our struggles, the threats and the intimidation, the arrests and the beatings, we could see things changing. The seed had been planted in us. We knew a better Ireland, a better life for working-class people was possible, and we were prepared to take a stand together and fight for it.

“There was no going back to the old ways.”

THE BATTLE AGAINST THE DEVELOPERS In line with the British military’s counter-insurgency strategy of containment, the old Market, with its old terraced streets that reached out to East Bridge Street on one side and across Cromac Street into Belfast City Centre on the other, was bulldozed.

The modern homes that replaced the old ‘two-up, two-down’ houses had indoor toilets and bathrooms were welcomed by the residents.

Behind this regeneration, however, lay British Army and intelligence services’ plans designed

to contain and control the population. East Bridge Street was closed off with a single row of houses. The narrow Market streets that flowed into it like tributaries flowing into a main watercourse, providing unfettered access to the city centre, were dammed shut.

On the other side, the numerous streets that crossed Cromac Street, linking it with Joy and Alfred Streets on the City Centre side of the Market, were redesigned as cul-de-sacs, leaving the area with just two access roads running on to Cromac Street, which was also widened into a four-lane thoroughfare that cut the district in two.

Where the area was once an integrated inner city district, it was now marginalised.

Running in tandem with the British military/ security strategy, the industries such as the markets (from where the area gets its name), the tanneries, bakeries and other commercial enterprises migrated to new sites.

So the community that benefited from these industries now found itself marginalised on a second front.

The battle against this marginalisation is now being fought against the developers and the hedge-funders whose insatiable appetite for profit goes on.

Hargey says of the Peace Process which heralded the end of the armed conflict and led to the Good Friday Agreement: “The Market saw massive amounts of

At the heart of the scheme are eight tunnels that run under East Bridge. The MDA plans to develop these as part of a wider social economy scheme involving a crèche, coffee shops and a health and bike hire project.

Crucially, the scheme is aimed at reconnecting the Market community with Belfast City Centre, its natural hinterland.

Even though there has been initial support for the scheme, Belfast City Council’s Planning Department has approved a massive development at Stewart Street.

Sinn Féin Councillor Deirdre Hargey said: “This will not only cut the community off even further from the city centre but from the very tunnels themselves. At 14 storeys, this is not only a massive overdevelopment of the site but development on steroids.”

This decision, coupled with the Planning Department’s attempt to rezone land designated for social housing for commercial development on the Gasworks site on the southern edge of the Market has enraged a community who see their needs being superseded by private developers.

Fionntán Hargey said: “The forces ranged against our community have vast wealth on their side. They have almost limitless resources to call upon. They have a dizzying array of political influence and international financial connections.

“We don’t have their wealth; we don’t have their resources; we don’t have their international financial connections or political influence.

“But what we do have is a history of resistance. What we do have is a tradition of struggle. And we have a wealth that they can’t buy – our own people.”

12 June / Meitheamh 2017

www.anphoblacht.com

The six-person panel charged with redacting documents in the PSNI Legacy Unit includes four former Special Branch officers and one former RUC Intelligence officer

Martina Anderson MEP

Collusion was not an illusion AS Sinn Féin MEP for the North, I have brought families of British state violence and their advocates on delegations to Brussels and Strasbourg on four separate occasions.

Some families have been waiting 40 years on inquests and had already gone to the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR).

Twelve days after the first delegation, on 11 March 2014, working closely with Relatives for Justice, I knocked on the door of Human Rights Commissioner Nils Muiznieks at his office in Strasbourg. I took human rights lawyer Niall Murphy and Paul O’Connor from the Pat Finucane Centre with me.

I also arranged a separate meeting with representatives from the Directorate of Human Rights from the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), including an official from the Department for the Execution of Judgments of the ECHR. When he arrived in Belfast in November 2014 to make a keynote address at a University of Ulster, he said: “The UK Government cannot wash its hands of the investigations, including funding of the investigations. These are the most serious human rights violations.

“Until now there has been virtual impunity for Legacy Unit, which has persistently refused to the state actors involved and I think the Govern- comply with deadlines and is only disclosing ment has a responsibility to uphold its obliga- requests for material bit by bit – piecemeal. tions under the European Convention to fund There is no doubt that the “passage of time” investigations and to get the results. tactic is being used with unnecessary redacting “The issue of impunity is a very, very serious of documents that were in the public domain one and the UK Government has a responsibil- (e.g. open court transcripts) and the Legacy Unit ity to uphold the rule of law. This is not just an is using and abusing the classification rule. issue of dealing with the past, it has to do with The six-person panel charged with redacting upholding the law in general." documents in the PSNI Legacy Unit includes four The investigation of state collusion and former Special Branch officers and one former state-sanctioned murder of citizens took place RUC Intelligence officer who, between them, have at a time when the North was under direct rule served with 92 RUC potential inquest witnesses. from London, therefore it falls to Britain to fund In 1982, after international attention focused all legacy matters. on the RUC policy of “shoot to kill”, British police There have only been 11 legacy deaths inquests chiefs Stalker and Sampson were appointed in despite a “package of measures” put in place in 1985 to investigate the cover-up. response to the ECHR finding in 2001 that the British Government was not Article 2 compliant.

However, 12 years on after an ECHR ruling on inquests into a number of “shoot to kill” murders by state forces, in July 2013, an ECHR judge ruling on there being no inquests into the murders of Martin McCaughey and Desmond Grew, concluded that the “state’s agents are benefiting from virtual impunity as a result of the passage of time”.

Senior Coroner John Lecky has said that his office will not take the blame if the British Government faces further sanctions from the ECHR. HUMAN RIGHTS COMMISSIONER Furthermore, the Coroner’s Office has met resistance from the PSNI’s

5 Murdered: Human rights lawyer Pat Finucane

Referring to “a force within a force”, Stalker said that the RUC Special Branch “targeted subjects, briefed officers and after shooting removed men, cars and guns before carrying out a private briefing”.

It is believed that Stalker’s office was set on fire by the same intelligence services that he was investigating.

There is a myth still peddled that the British state’s “security forces” – the RUC and the British Army – were responsible for “only” 10% of the killings in the North. Nonsense.

The fact is that the British state was involved in more than 30% of the killings during the conflict and it was the British state that killed Pat Finucane.

For all its faults, the De Silva report into Pat Finucane’s killing confirmed that “85% of

'The UK Government cannot wash its hands of the investigations, including funding of the investigations.

These are the most serious human rights violations.'

NILS MUIZNIEKS

5 Investigator: British police chief John Stalker

intelligence used by loyalists came from the security forces”.

The RUC Special Branch was up to its necks in collusion and murder.

British Cabinet ministers have been saying that if a truth recovery process was to be established it should focus on “those who were responsible for most of the violence and that the state would also have to use Public Interest Immunity [gagging orders] concerning its role”.

The state policies of murder with impunity are much worse than that of non-state actors.

There were 30,000 republican prisoners in jail during the conflict and between us we served over 100,000 years. Compare that to sentences served by state forces.

Even if Theresa May’s Tory Government – supported by the unionists – tries to repeal the Human Rights Act, Human Rights Commissioner Nils Muznieks has confirmed that Britain would still be legally responsible for its Article 2 obligations that were breached when they governed here during direct rule.

We will not let Britain, its actors or its mouthpieces rewrite history.

June / Meitheamh 2017

www.anphoblacht.com

13

Fine Gael/Ind Government launches assault on workers’ pay

BY EOIN Ó MURCHÚ THE Dublin Government has launched a full-scale attack on public sector workers. While mouthing about restoring some of the pay stolen from these workers at the height of the recession, they have declared a hardline stance about any pay restoration being based on the Government’s ability to pay.

In an ironic and typically dishonest twist, the Government set up a tame Public Service Pay Commission, which, wonder of wonders, produced a “report” exactly in tune with Government policy and with the hard-right ideology advanced by Fine Gael, Shane Ross and Katherine Zappone.

The strategy is also crystal clear, even if it’s a bit jaded at this point.

Spokesperson after spokesperson, media commentator after media

5 Improvements in public sector pay ultimately should act as a spur to improving the private sector also Leo Varadkar

The ground is set to create an artificial confrontation between public and private sector workers while the bosses and investors keep their taxes down and their profits up commentator all bemoan the low wages being paid in the private sector and then they use this point to argue for public sector workers to be brought down.

At best this would be an ugly begrudgery on the lines of ‘I don’t have a decent pension or weekly income, so no one else should’.

There is, of course, a simpler answer to this problem to the extent that it really exists. Why not raise private sector pay to public sector levels?

But don’t hold your breath for Fine Gael and the Ross-Zappone clique to put that forward as it would hit the very comfortable living standards of their backers in business and enterprise.

Lower private sector pay means higher profits and dividends for the bosses and the investors.

In the real world, an increase in

Shane Ross

Katherine Zappone

income for one section of workers is a benchmark for others to campaign on. So improvements in public sector pay ultimately should act as a spur to improving the private sector also.

But that’s not how the media portray it.

On RTÉ, Ingrid Miley solemnly assures viewers that the unions must sell any deal to their members (are the unions different from their members?) and the Government must sell it to private sector workers.

So the ground is set to create an artificial confrontation between public and private sector workers while the bosses and investors keep their taxes down and their profits up.

It’s not that private sector workers will take to the streets in protest. The objective is to weaken the resolve of public sector workers to fight.

The context is, of course, the amount of money at the Government’s disposal to meet the various demands on the public purse.

But the point should be made loud and clear – bus drivers don’t have the responsibility of providing hospital beds or schools; those with more money than the rest of us do.

And the issue to a large extent therefore isn’t what the rich can afford to pay in taxes but what income now and what pension in the future will ensure a decent, comfortable life for people working in the public sector – and in the private sector too.

Let’s repeat. Not one penny that the bosses save by keeping their taxes down will go into the pockets of private sector workers without a struggle by those workers.

And of course, the best way to carry on that struggle is through a trades union.

But the struggle, as this issue of public pay policy shows, is not just an industrial struggle. It is a political one as well.

In France, trade unionists and political activists are already rallying to begin

the fight against Emmanuel Macron’s neoliberal agenda. We in Ireland need to follow that example by waging a united struggle of trade unions and Left political parties.

Tragically, however, SIPTU (and Jack O’Connor) are still deluded by the dishonest pretence of the Labour Party that it is in any way different from the gang who imposed austerity on the working class while the bulk of the trade union movement stands aloof from any political affiliation.

At this time of serious Government

Not one penny that the bosses save by keeping their taxes down will go into the pockets of private sector workers without a struggle by those workers

5 New face of neoliberalism: France’s President Emmanuel Macron

assault, surely it is time for the unions to sit down with the genuine Left (with Sinn Féin in particular) and put forward a programme of resistance, not a mealymouthed ‘negotiation’ leading to a compromise paid for by workers’ living standards.

But Sinn Féin activists too must face up to the need to fight neoliberalism on a broad front, but especially in opposition to the EU’s plans – embodied above all by Macron in France – for greater EU integration and for a further weakening of national sovereignty a hundred years after the Proclamation of 1916.

14 June / Meitheamh 2017

www.anphoblacht.com

EYEWITNESS WEST BANK

An open prison in which people are slowly suffocating

BY SINN FÉIN ECONOMIC ADVISER

EOLAN DE BÚRCA

AFTER A MONTH of volunteering in the West Bank with a children’s rights NGO, I am left with a sense of despair for the Palestinian people forced to exist under a brutal apartheid Israeli regime. Every night, every day, the experiences of just four weeks living in the West Bank haunt me.

I spent four weeks in March and April living in Bethlehem (arranged by Volunteer Palestine) and working in Hebron in schools and social centres across the West Bank with youngsters aged 8 to 16 under the umbrella of Defence of

Life for the more than 30,000 Palestinians in the neighbourhood is like a living hell the Children International, which promotes and protects the human rights of Palestinian kids.

Children in Palestine have been deeply traumatised by the harassment and casual violence they suffer daily from the Israeli military and settlers. A rising number are suffering arrest and imprisonment. More than 300 Palestinian kids are currently languishing in Israeli jails, some of them held in solitary confinement and tortured, psychologically as well as physically.

Palestinian children in the West Bank are regularly physically and psychologically abused by the Israelis, routinely mistreated at

checkpoints by combat troops and paramilitary police.

It was seriously distressing to see children who were almost devoid of hope and living in an atmosphere of fear and oppression that would challenge any adult, not to mind a child.

One workshop involved inviting children to draw their dreams to give an idea of what they are thinking about, their worries and their hopes for the future.

The parallels with the suffering of children in the Six Counties during the conflict were stark.

Pictures had soldiers and checkpoints. One young boy drew a picture of an airplane and said that he wished he could fly around Palestine to help everyone. Ambulances, sirens and the general paraphernalia of war featured regularly in their images.

Social workers alongside me told me of distressing case histories that reflect the daily ordeals of many, many Palestinian children.

The parents of one 13-year-old boy saw him being kidnapped not long after he arrived home from school by hostile soldiers, blindfolded, his hands bound with cable ties, dragged screaming in an army vehicle. Some hours later, he was found dumped at the side of the road like a sack of rubbish.

Another 11-year-old was abducted by the Israeli Army and threatened with castration by heavily-armed men before he was released without charge but left traumatised and prone to incessant bed-wetting and nightmares as a result.

What can a terrified parent do in the face of such overpowering force and state violence?

There is nowhere to turn to get justice.

A social worker who works with the families

5 Eolan de Búrca (right) after a workshop in a social centre in Hebron with Palestinian youth

Palestinian children in the West Bank are regularly physically and psychologically abused by the Israelis, routinely mistreated at checkpoints by combat troops and paramilitary police

Israeli tear gas and guns against planting trees ISRAELI SETTLERS attacking Palestinians in the West Bank is a regular occurrence, including settlers driving their cars at Palestinian pedestrians.

The Israeli authorities know full well that these are deliberate acts designed to terrorise, maim or even kill people but they are dismissed as accidents if they’re even taken seriously at all.

A simple and totally peaceful ceremony involving the planting of trees on Palestinian land next to an illegal settlement in Hebron (with me also planting a tree) resulted in the Israeli Army assaulting and arresting two Palestinian activists – for doing 5 Eolan plants a tree on Palestinian land next to an illegal Israeli settlement and nothing more than planting trees!

During the arrests, armed and volatile (right) a tear gas canister on the ground in Bethlehem ('one of many fired at me') Israeli settlers appeared, shouting abuse from his last protest in Palestine It wasn’t the only time I felt that way. Israeli settlement on Palestinian land and menacing us with their guns under The first demonstration I attended between Bethlehem and Ramallah. the protection of their army. I truly I marched with over 100 locals, feared I could be killed at any second. was a peaceful rally against an illegal

relayed these stories to me. Events such as these are, sadly, everyday occurrences.

Israel’s campaign of murdering Palestinian minors has been well-documented and I learned of many such instances during my stay, including (as of 10 April) Jassem Muhammad Nakhla, the fourth minor killed and 18th Palestinian killed in the West Bank in 2017.

When 17-year-old Qusay al-Umour was murdered by the Israeli Army, the BADIL human rights organisation reported: “Whether he was throwing stones at the soldiers or not, al-Umour could not have presented a lethal threat to the well-protected

varying in age from 12 to 70.

When we got within 200 feet of the illegal settlement on the hilltop we saw the cordon of combat troops protecting it. An Israeli military drone appeared above us, no doubt filming the people taking part.

We walked slowly forwards, carrying the flag of Palestine.

A barrage of tear gas grenades was unleashed by the Israeli military. The toxic gas enveloped us, choking men, women and children. It was absolutely scary. I thought my head was going to explode as my vision almost completely went.

Everyone started to run but the Israelis kept firing. Canisters whizzed by my head. They are metal, about six inches thick and three inches wide, with the potential to kill if they hit your head.

A Palestinian guy around my age had

When we got within 200 feet of the illegal settlement on the hilltop we saw the cordon of combat troops protecting it to be rushed down the hill after being hit in the back of the head with a tear gas canister. It looked as if he was in excruciating pain.

An old man, aged around 70, was hurried down the hill on a makeshift stretcher, put in the back of jeep and rushed away after suffering from tear gas inhalation. Thankfully, he recovered but everyone is well aware that the Israelis killed an eight-month-old baby in Bethlehem in October 2015 by exposure to tear gas.

All other demonstrations are regularly

June / Meitheamh 2017

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5 The entrance to the Aida refugee camp in Bethlehem – the key is the Palestinian symbol for the right to return to their homes which the Israelis ran them out of

5 A youngster waves the flag of Palestine at a demonstration against an illegal Israeli settlement in a village in the West Bank between Bethlehem and Ramallah

5 Israel's 'Apartheid Wall' in Bethlehem

5 Israeli soldiers arrest two men who were planting trees

Israeli Border Police from a distance of around 100 metres, and the use of live ammunition against him was therefore unjustified.”

When I was working in Hebron, I felt at firsthand the hourly tension experienced in Tel

The parallels with the suffering of children in the Six Counties during the conflict were stark Remuida. It was both exhausting and frightening. I saw the effects on locals of living in such a constant state of high alert.

I can only imagine the long-term damage to

people’s mental health living in these conditions of never-ending stress and fear.

Tel Remeida is a neighbourhood where around 800 notoriously aggressive (and armed) settlers live under the protection of the Israeli Army.

I saw how daily life for the more than 30,000 Palestinians in the neighbourhood is like a living hell.

It is classified as a “closed military zone” within which two systems of law exist, depending on whether you are Palestinian or an illegal Israeli settler. If you’re a soldier or a settler, you can abuse the Palestinian population with impunity.

You can, literally, get away with murder.

On one particularly difficult day, we did a workshop with a number of youths, among them a 12-year-old girl. She was clearly traumatised,

outlining how she was about to burst with the pressure from constant attacks from settlers and harassment from Israeli soldiers. By the end of the workshop her hands were trembling and she seemed totally devoid of hope. She was a nervous wreck.

She was in such a state that myself and another worker decided it was best to walk her home as she was so distressed. Her house was on the other side of a military checkpoint, where many settlers lived. My colleague asked the two Israeli soldiers, fingering their machine guns, if we could pass through to walk this child home as she was clearly really anxious.

Point-blank, the soldiers refused our civil request. Pleading failed to move them. As a last resort, my colleague implored the soldier: “Well,

An 11-year-old was abducted by the Israeli Army and threatened with castration by heavilyarmed men before he was released without charge but left traumatised can you guarantee her safety?” The answer was an unsympathetic “No”.

She made it home safely that day. Every day, I wonder will she make it home safely; even if she will get home alive.

The Israelis killed an eight-month-old baby in Bethlehem in October 2015 by exposure to tear gas

5 At a demonstration against an illegal Israeli settlement in a village in the West Bank before Israelis opened fire on the crowd

suppressed in the same manner.

On my second-last protest, the Israeli Army also threw sound bombs, which not only hurt your ears but are also dangerous due to flying shrapnel when they explode.

On my final day in Palestine, a young woman was taken away by ambulance after the Israelis aimed a sound bomb directly at her.

15

I asked a Palestinian friend of mine who has two small children how he keeps it together. He has humour.

He’s just a nice guy. He says he has no choice. This is his homeland, where he lives for his family and he is resigned to the fact that he could be murdered any day of the week. When his kids go to sleep at night, however, he admits that he cries out of worry for them. There

are tears in his eyes as he tells me this.

The level of pressure is just torture in itself. I get a knot in my stomach even thinking about him and his family now.

The guilt I feel about being to escape the daily repression by the Israeli apartheid regime is tempered by the experience, witnessing the spirit and dogged determination of the Palestinian people in the face of huge odds, a cruel regime

bolstered or turned a blind eye to by the West and heedless of the countless condemnations by the United Nations.

Palestinians do value solidarity from abroad, particularly Ireland.

Many told me that they were inspired by the bravery of Irish republican prisoners, with the name of Bobby Sands on the lips of many.

Gerry Adams got a thumbs-up from a fruit seller in Hebron when I explained I was a Sinn Féiner from Ireland.

“Ah, yes. Gerry Adams,” he nodded and smiled: “He’s a good man.”

And then he wouldn’t let me pay for my orange.

SOLIDARITY WITH THE PEOPLE OF PALESTINE Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement

bdsmovement.net Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign

www.ipsc.ie

Sadaka – The Ireland Palestine Alliance

www.sadaka.ie

16 June / Meitheamh 2017

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The National Hunger Strike Commemoration takes place in the home county of Seán 'Jack' McNeela, Michael Gaughan and Frank Stagg on Sunday 13 August – main speaker former hunger striker Gerry Kelly MLA

MAYO’S HEROES

BY JOHN HEDGES GEORGE STAGG and his wife Mary were laughing with Senator Rose Conway Walsh in the corridors of the Sinn Féin offices in Leinster House when they met to talk about the upcoming National Hunger Strike Commemoration in their native County Mayo.

Rose’s confinement to a wheelchair after an Achilles tendon operation hadn’t stopped her coming up from the West and freewheeling around the sixth-floor offices in Dublin but navigating the meeting room packed with chairs was causing some juggling and chuckling.

When we sat down to talk about Frank, however, George’s chin dropped to his chest, his fingers drew invisible circles on the table and his eyes welled up with tears at the memory of his older brother’s life and death in the republican cause.

Mary would reach out and touch his arm and George would pick up again, smile and recall the character that was Frank, radiating his brother’s sense of fun, pride and determination.

“He never doubted himself,” George said, shaking his head vigorously. “Never doubted his cause.”

George is a brother of IRA Volunteer Frank Stagg, from Hollymount, County Mayo, who died in Wakefield Prison, Yorkshire, on 12 February 1976 after 62 days on hunger strike.

Two years previously, on 3 June 1974, another Mayo man, Michael Gaughan, died from pneumonia after a force-feeding tube pierced his lung in Parkhurst Prison on the Isle of Wight. He was only 24 years old.

They followed in the tradition of Mayoman Seán ‘Jack’ McNeela, who died on 19 April 1940 in Arbour Hill Military Detention Barracks, Dublin, after 55 days on hunger strike along with his friend and comrade Tony D’Arcy from Galway.

Jack McNeela’s story played a big part in raising Rose Conway Walsh’s awareness of her county’s proud republican history as both are from Ballycroy.

Mayo’s place in the fight for freedom was to also capture the imagination of young Proinsias Stagg. (“He was always called Proinsias at home but the British couldn’t pronounce Proinsias,” Mary explained, so Frank is used a lot.)

George recalled that their father, Henry, an IRA veteran of the Tan War and Civil War wounded in the shoulder on active service, used to gather his sons and daughters around and tell them stories about the past and read to them from books.

“This was at the same time as his old comrades used to call to the house and they’d go off to one side of the house to have secret talks,” George recalled with a knowing smile and a wink.

Frank was born in 1942, the seventh of 13 children (seven boys and six girls).

George recalled that he was “a small man, five-foot-six, with jet-black hair and a dark complexion and a great sense of humour”.

After he left school, Frank worked as an assistant gamekeeper with his uncle at Ballynahinch Castle in Connemara. “He was mad into game shooting and fishing,” George said. “The money probably wasn’t great but he thoroughly enjoyed the work.”

Frank was also fond of Gaelic football, handball and singing. “He was a good singer but he wasn’t as good as he thought he was,” George laughed.

“He thought he was a great singer.”

He would sing rebel songs and old Irish ballads,

Seán 'Jack' McNeela

5 The handball Frank played with to All-Ireland level, winning Mayo and Connacht Minor Championships; his lighter and penknife; and an armband worn at a commemoration in New York after his death

even penning a song or two himself, One he'd titled ‘The Hollymount Queen’ and included the names of as many neighbours as he could manage, Mary said.

His passion, though, was politics. Frank and his father with his republican background were “both very much of the same mind”, George recalled.

ENGLAND Frank, like countless others, had to emigrate to find work, seeking employment in England, where the Staggs had relatives, particularly in Coventry.

In England, Frank worked as a bus conductor and later qualified as a bus driver. In 1970, he married Bridie Armstrong from Carnicon, County Mayo.

He joined Sinn Féin in Luton in 1972 and shortly afterwards joined the IRA. George and Mary recalled that as soon as the conflict in the Six Counties erupted with the suppression of the Civil Rights Movement by the RUC, B-Specials and the Unionist Party regime running the ‘Orange State’, Frank became active in fund-raising for holidays in England for children from the North.

Frank remained in touch with home and spent his annual holidays in Hollymount up to the year of his arrest and imprisonment in 1973. In the words of his mother, Mary: “He never forgot he was Irish.”

And Mary never forgot her son.

Mary regularly undertook the arduous journey

from the west coast of Ireland, across the country and the Irish Sea to the various prisons all over England Frank was held in. And it was all for a half-hour visit after being subjected to a stripsearch. It was not unusual for relatives of IRA prisoners, classified as top-security ‘Category A’, to arrive at a prison only to be told then that the prisoner had been moved (“ghosted”, families called it) to somewhere hundreds of miles away.

Frank’s mother had to travel to six different prisons to see her son.

She was with him when he died.

“Mother was very strong,” George recalled. “She stood by him 100%.”

It was a solidarity that was sorely needed.

“Frank was almost always in isolation because he wouldn’t do prison work or wear prison uniform,” George said. “He was constantly in dungeons, down below decks. Filthy holes with lice.

“He just wouldn’t give in. His spirit was good, even when he wasn’t well physically.

“Never was there any question that he was an Irish republican and therefore a political prisoner.”

When Michael Gaughan died, Frank was “devastated”, George said.

Even though the two IRA men were from Mayo (Gaughan was from Ballina), they hadn’t known each other before meeting in prison and having adjoining cells.

“Michael was very staunch but he wasn’t from a

Michael Gaughan

Frank Stagg

5 Frank's wedding

5 Frank's mother and Mary stand at the Fine Gael/Labour grave shortly after his burial

republican background,” George noted and added: “He was an outstanding young man.”

Because Michael was being force-fed during his hunger strike, his death took everyone by surprise.

During force-feeding, the prisoner was seated on a chair and held down by the shoulders and chin. A lever was pushed between the teeth – by brute strength if the prisoner resisted, as they often did to the best of their ability – to prise open the jaw and a wooden clamp shoved into the mouth to keep it open. (It was this treatment that broke Frank's teeth, Mary said.)

A thick, greased tube was then put through a

June / Meitheamh 2017

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17

5 Troops and gardaí in riot gear take over the streets of Ballina

Frank Stagg’s body hijacked by Fine Gael/Labour Government THE remains of Frank Stagg were on the way to Dublin by air when the Government in Dublin, to prevent a display of republican sentiment such as accompanied the funeral of Michael Gaughan two years previously, diverted the plane to Shannon Airport.

Armed Garda Special Branch men seized the coffin and locked it in the airport mortuary.

The following day, Frank’s coffin was airlifted by helicopter to Robeen Church at Hollymount in County Mayo.

On Saturday 21 February, a private Requiem Mass was held and his body was taken to Ballina, where it was borne by Special Branch men to a grave in an isolated corner of Leigue Cemetery, some distance from the Republican Plot where he had asked to be buried.

In the hope of preventing a transfer, six feet

hole in the clamp, thrust down the throat and into the stomach. Often the tube would go into the windpipe and have to be withdrawn. During this procedure the victim would be constantly vomiting.

BROKEN PROMISES Following the death of Michael Gaughan as a result of the force-feeding, the remaining hunger strikers ended their fast after assurances from the prison authorities that they would be transferred to a prison in Ireland.

The assurances were to join the list of broken promises.

A month after the death of Michael Gaughan, Frank was moved from Parkhurst on the Isle of Wight, off the south coast of England, to Long Lartin in Worcestershire, in the midlands.

There, on 10 October 1974, Frank once more resorted to a hunger strike because he had not been transferred to Ireland and because he and his relatives were being subjected to degrading searches before and after visits.

All his visits were stopped, although his mother was allowed a brief visit on 26 October. Thirtyone days into the hunger strike, he was told that his demand for repatriation would be met and he ended his hunger strike.

PRICE SISTERS, HUGH FEENEY, GERRY KELLY In March 1975, Dolours and Marian Price were transferred to Armagh Jail and, in April, Hugh Feeney and Gerry Kelly (the main speaker at this year’s National Hunger Strike Commemoration) were moved to Long Kesh.

But Frank Stagg remained imprisoned in England.

By this time he was in Wakefield, where he was being kept in solitary confinement because he refused to do prison work.

On 14 December 1975, Frank went on hunger strike once again. His demands were for an end to solitary confinement and no prison work pending transfer to a prison in Ireland (Long Kesh).

This time any promises from the authorities would have to be given in writing.

But Frank knew this would be his final hunger strike – “one way or another”, George told Rose Conway Walsh.

George was with Frank in the days before he died, when Frank dictated to George a codicil to his will about wanting a republican funeral with

5 Mary and George Stagg

IRA military honours, assigning responsibility for his burial arrangements to Derek Highstead, then Sinn Féin National Organiser in Britain.

Mary recalled that Frank was “wasting away, taking little, short breaths” but he was still determined, George said.

“Frank led that process. He called out what he wanted and then he signed it, ready for if the worst came to the worst.”

Frank’s funeral arrangements had been brought up before.

“He knew where he was going, he knew where this was headed.”

Frank had an outside hope that the Irish Government would put pressure on the British Government to agree a transfer to Long Kesh even though it was, as George said, “a vicious, vindictive, anti-republican, real Blueshirt government”.

Frank was under no illusions about what might happen though. Nevertheless, he was unwavering.

“He knew that this hunger strike was his last hunger strike, either way – he either got what he wanted or he would die.

“He wasn’t going to come off the hunger strike until he had been moved, not just told again he was going to be moved.

“This was the end; his last hunger strike.”

Frank remained committed to his principles and, after fasting for 62 days, died on 12 February 1976.

• FURTHER READING: Special Category – The IRA in English Prisons, Volume 1, 1968-1978, by Ruan O’Donnell

5 (Above) Frank's instructions for his funeral to be a republican one with full IRA honours

of cement was afterwards placed on top of the coffin.

On the Sunday, the Republican Movement held its ceremonies at the Republican Plot. A volley of shots was fired and a pledge made that Frank Stagg’s body would be moved to the Republican Plot in accordance with his wishes.

For six months there was a permanent 24-hour Garda presence in Leigue Cemetery but eventually it was lifted. On the night of 6 November 1976, a group of IRA Volunteers, accompanied by a priest, dug down in an empty plot beside the grave (presciently purchased for £5 by George Stagg at the time of Frank’s burial), tunnelled under the cement and removed the coffin.

After a short religious service they reinterred the remains of Frank Stagg in the Republican Plot, beside Michael Gaughan.

18 June / Meitheamh 2017

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Behind the death of Volunteer Brendan O’Callaghan lies the intrigue of Britain’s Dirty War

BY PEADAR WHELAN IRA VOLUNTEER Brendan O’Callaghan was shot dead by British soldiers lying in ambush on 23 April 1977 in the car park of The Hunting Lodge bar on Belfast’s Stewartstown Road.

British troops, dug in at the rear of the premises, opened fire on two IRA Volunteers who, they claimed, were cocking a pistol. Brendan (21) was hit by two rounds and died of his wounds. The other Volunteer was uninjured and evaded arrest.

As Brendan lay mortally wounded, the British soldiers broke cover and ordered customers back into the premises as they attempted to apprehend the dying Volunteer’s comrades.

Eyewitnesses were clear that the troops were in uniform but were heavily disguised and with their faces blackened, indicating that they were involved in a surveillance operation at the popular bar.

The IRA confirmed in a statement that the father of two from the Lenadoon area was a Volunteer on active service as part of a three-member unit “designed to protect republican areas after recent bombings and shootings carried out by British and loyalist elements”.

The story behind Volunteer Brendan O’Callaghan’s killing reveals so much about the Belfast of 1977, in particular, the so-called ‘Dirty War’ and the counter-insurgency tactics deployed

by British Military Intelligence and the British Establishment at Westminster and Whitehall.

The cold strategy was to undermine nationalist communities by fomenting sectarianism, with the ultimate objective being the military defeat by the British state of the IRA. It is also a story that sheds light on the evolving intelligence strategies that British Military Intelligence, RUC Special Branch and MI5 were developing as the nature of the war changed.

These were the years that saw the British introduce their three-pronged strategy of “Ulsterisation, Normalisation and Criminalisation” with the intention of framing the context of the conflict at home and across the world as an internal ‘law and order’ issue for Britain rather than a political struggle.

“Ulsterisation” led to many English, Welsh and Scottish troops being taken off the frontline and replaced with a highly-militarised RUC and Ulster

Defence Regiment soldiers.

“Criminalisation”, both in political and propaganda terms, was pumping out the lie that the IRA was a mafia-type gang rather than a politically-motivated guerrilla army, a People's Army.

Within the newly-built H-Blocks of Long Kesh, captured republicans who had previously won the right to be treated as political prisoners were to be subjected to a regime geared to break their political will and psychological resolve.

On the day he was killed, Brendan O’Callaghan and other IRA Volunteers had gone to the Hunting Lodge bar to arrest people suspected of acting as British agents provocateurs. The British soldiers hidden behind the building claimed they saw the Volunteers with a handgun and opened fire.

Why British troops would be staking out the bar and keeping it under surveillance is open to conjecture but the Hunting Lodge was one of

On the day he was killed, Brendan O’Callaghan and other IRA Volunteers had gone to the Hunting Lodge bar to arrest people suspected of acting as British agents provocateurs three local bars targeted in bomb attacks around that time. One of the attacks, on the White Fort on the Andersonstown Road in July 1976, left three men dead.

While the media were understandably describing the bombings as sectarian attacks and laying the blame for the explosions on unionists (in the case of the White Fort attack, going as far to identify the culprits as members of the Ulster Volunteer Force), republicans were looking closer to home.

The IRA was sure that the British Army was recruiting people from the nationalist community, training them in the use of explosives and weapons, and directing them to carry out attacks on targets within nationalist areas.

An Phoblacht has spoken to senior republican

5 Volunteer Brendan O’Callaghan

sources who described that period from 1976, in the aftermath of the disastrous 1975 truce as “a very critical phase of the struggle”.

The British had used the truce to undermine the struggle and were pushing forward with the criminalisation policy.

But it was their day-to-day counter-insurgency tactics and their increased use of agents provocateurs, particularly in Belfast, that underpinned Britain’s military intentions and pointed to the ever-increasing and important role of the British Intelligence services (British Military Intelligence and MI5, the Security Service) in the conflict.

In the early 1970s, Britain’s crude attempts to fan sectarianism in its gerrymandered statelet centred on the Military Reaction Force (MRF), a death squad made up of 40 hand-picked members of the British Army who operated from 1971 to 1973 under the command of a brigadier.

Its genesis was in the counter-insurgency

doctrine of Brigadier Frank Kitson, developed particularly from his colonial experiences in Kenya and Malaya.

The MRF was officially tasked with targeting IRA activists but its “elite” members almost dismissively admitted in a BBC TV Panorama investigation broadcast in December 2013 that the MRF carried out ‘drive-by’ shootings of nationalists. These included people keeping watch at barricades to protect their homes from loyalist sectarian gangs in the years after unionist mobs and the RUC launched pogroms against nationalist areas, razing entire neighbourhoods such as Bombay Street to the ground.

Among those killed in a series of shootings across Belfast in 1972 were Patrick McVeigh, who was killed at a barricade in west Belfast while four others were wounded. Also killed, in the St James's area, was Daniel Rooney. His friend, Brendan Brennan, was wounded.

5 Volunteer Brendan O'Callaghan's sister Pauline with her daughter Danielle and her children along with Brendan's other sister, Michelle

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19

GAS H-BLOCKS PRICE Gerry Kelly’s inside story RISES BREAK-OUT

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MILITARY REACTION FORCE

5 Republican News, 30 April 1977

5The murderous MRF and other undercover British Army death squads worked to Downing Street's strategy with the British military on the ground

In June 1972, Jean Smyth, a 24-year-old mother of one, was shot by the MRF as she sat in a car on the Glen Road but the RUC told her family that she was shot by the IRA because they mistook her car for an undercover British Army vehicle.

According to republican sources, British Military Intelligence remodelled the MRF in the wake of it being exposed as being responsible for the killing and wounding of numerous nationalist civilians in its quest to fuel sectarianism.

The use of agents provocateurs pointed to the ever-increasing role of British Military Intelligence and MI5 in the conflict

5 British Army soldier and MRF agent Ted Stuart

Added to the political pressure for disbanding or reconfiguring the unit was the success the IRA had in identifying and attacking MRF commercial business fronts. These included the Four Square Laundry operating in west Belfast, a massage parlour on the Antrim Road in north Belfast, and an office in Belfast City Centre.

The British Army acknowledged that one soldier (Ted Stuart) was killed in the attack on a Four Square Laundry van in Twinbrook. The IRA maintained they killed a further two undercover

military agents secreted in a roof compartment of the laundry van and three operatives in the massage parlour.

The MRF, reported to be reconstituted as the Special Reconnaissance Unit (SRU), was to rely on mostly nationalist civilians or, in some cases, IRA Volunteers who had been ‘turned’ by the enemy.

The IRA began to unravel the new modus operandi when two of these agents provocateurs (dubbed “Freds” by British Military Intelligence), Vinty Hetherington and Myles McGrogan,

BBC TV Panorama exposes undercover British Army death squad killing civilians in Belfast

5 Our front page after the BBC 'Panorama' exposé tracked down MRF agents

neither of whom was a member of the IRA, were arrested and charged by the RUC over the killing of two RUC officers in Finaghy on the outskirts of west Belfast.

The charges were later dropped but, while on remand, Hetherington eventually admitted under questioning by the IRA to being an agent.

He disclosed that he and other members of the group were based in Palace Barracks, Holywood.

He revealed they were supplied with money and women and had been taken away for training in England, where they were quartered in a large country house in Essex.

There they were given weapons, explosives and anti-interrogation training and sent back to the North.

As well as confessing his activities, Hetherington named a number of IRA Volunteers as “Freds”, something he would he would later admit was disinformation. According to An Phoblacht's sources, this was a deliberate strategy designed to create confusion and paranoia as it was linked to an alleged plot to poison republican prisoners being held on remand in Crumlin Road Jail.

Campaigner and author Margaret Urwin (in her paper Counter-Gangs: A History of Undercover Military Units in Northern Ireland 1971-1976, written for Spinwatch and the Pat Finucane Centre) said that a third MRF agent, Seamus O’Brien, was alleged to have been involved in a bomb attack on the Strand Bar, in the small nationalist east

Belfast enclave of Short Strand on 12 April 1975.

Six people, four of them women, were killed. The women and one man died instantly; the sixth victim, a second man, died a week later.

(Hetherington and McGrogan would be executed by the IRA in 1976 and 1977.)

An Phoblacht’s source told us that O’Brien, who had connections to the emerging Irish National

These were the years that saw the British introduce their three-pronged strategy of ‘Ulsterisation, Normalisation and Criminalisation’ Liberation Army, met his British military handlers in houses in west Belfast where, as well being debriefed, he received training and instructions on the use of firearms and explosives.

O’Brien, who was executed by the IRA in January 1976, was linked to attacks on three popular west Belfast bars – The White Fort, The Glenowen and The Hunting Lodge, where Volunteer Brendan O’Callaghan would be killed in 1977.

Even with its success in neutralising this MRF/ SRU unit, the IRA was only too aware that the intelligence war would intensify.

VOLUNTEER BRENDAN O’CALLAGHAN 40th ANNIVERSARY UPWARDS OF 200 republicans from across Belfast gathered in the grounds of the Roddy McCorley Society on Sunday 23 April, the 40th anniversary of Brendan O’Callaghan’s death on active service.

They heard numerous speakers pay respects to a man whose qualities as a husband, a father, a brother, a soldier, a comrade, a friend and a leader set him out as someone with special gifts who was a loss to his family, his community and the struggle.

Chaired by Sinn Féin’s Alex Maskey, the main speaker at the event was Brendan’s sister, Pauline, who described her brother’s life and experience growing up in war-torn Belfast and how it influenced his decision to join the IRA and fight back.

5 The crowd listens as Jim 'Jaz' McCann recalls his fallen comrade, his friendship and his courage

“When we hear IRA Volunteers referred to as a ‘terrorists’, ‘thugs’ or ‘non-worthy’ victims of the conflict it pierces our hearts,” Pauline said.

“Had Brendan worn the uniform of the state, he would have been labelled a hero.

“We will not accept a narrative of his life that undermines him or his character – he will not be lambasted by those who seek to secure only their version of the conflict.

“Brendan was not born an IRA Volunteer – he was, like so many, created an IRA activist.”

Among others speakers who stepped up to praise Brendan for his courage and friendship were comrades, such as former POWs and Blanketmen Jim ‘Jaz’ McCann and Seamus Finucane, Sinéad Moore (who was on protest in Armagh Women’s Prison), and senior republican Bobby Storey.

20 June / Meitheamh 2017

www.anphoblacht.com

The return of Con(vict) 12

BY MÍCHEÁL Mac DONNCHA

Remembering the Past

BY JUNE 1917, the most senior woman officer of the Irish Republican Army in 1916, Constance Gore Booth, Countess Markievicz, known to close friends and family as “Con”, had been in British custody for over a year. She was held in the Women’s Prison in Aylesbury, a town to the north-west of London, between Oxford and Luton.

Markievicz’s prison number was 12, prompting her to sign herself ironically “Con(vict) 12” when writing to her sister Eva. As the only remaining Irish republican female prisoner in England, she was deprived of any association with fellow political prisoners.

Conditions for the women in Aylesbury were atrocious.

Con described the prison as filthy, crawling with lice and other bugs, with appalling food, served in dirty dishes

Con described the prison as filthy, crawling with lice and other bugs, with appalling food and in meagre portions so that the prisoners were constantly hungry. While she and her supporters on the outside demanded political treatment for her, and segregation from criminals, Con had sympathy for her fellow prisoners.

Many were young women with mental health problems who were prone to what would now be called self-harm and there were several suicide attempts during Con’s time in Aylesbury.

Con was very close to her sister Eva who dedicated a poem to her and the executed 1916 leaders: And my own sister, through wild hours of pain, Whilst murderous bombs were blotting out the stars Little I thought to see you smile again As I did yesterday through prison bars.

While physically divided from her comrades, Con had growing support in Ireland. In August 1916, she had been elected President of Cumann na mBan. The Irishwomen’s International League petitioned the British Home Secretary on her behalf in February 1917. More and more public attention was focused on the plight of the Irish political prisoners.

At the start of June 1917, hundreds of Irish prisoners were still in jails in England. Most of these had been moved to Lewes Prison, near Brighton on the south coast of England, at Christmas 1916. Among them were the two most senior surviving commandants from the Rising, Eamon de Valera and Thomas Ashe. Both their commands

amnesty for all prisoners “now in confinement in connection with the rebellion of 1916”. He linked the releases directly to the Irish Convention.

The prisoners arrived by boat in Dún Laoghaire on 17 June and were greeted at Westland Row (now Pearse) railway station by many thousands of cheering people waving Tricolours.

The streets were thronged as the prisoners were carried in triumph and receptions for them were held all over the country.

Addressing the crowds in Cork, released prisoner Diarmuid Lynch said

5 Dublin Metropolitan Police clash with the crowd as the police move in to arrest Cathal Brugha and Count Plunkett on 10 June 1917 at Beresford Place, beside Liberty Hall in Dublin

had inflicted heavy casualties on the British Army in Easter Week but they escaped the firing squad because, after the executions of Seán Mac Diarmada and James Connolly on 12 May, the British Government concluded that further executions would be politically counter-productive, especially in the USA. US opinion was increasingly important in British imperial policy.

In April 1917, the US joined Britain and France in the war against Germany but it would be months before significant numbers of US troops were deployed to Europe and the British wanted to ensure the maximum commitment.

The election of Joe McGuinness, another Lewes prisoner, as MP for South Longford, increased the pressure.

Inside and outside the prisons, agitation grew. The Lewes prisoners commenced a no-work strike at the end of May, with de Valera moved to Parkhurst Jail as punishment.

Still with an eye to US opinion, at the end of May the British Government announced that an Irish Convention would be established. Its membership, agenda and outcome were set by the British who made clear that the future government of all Ireland would be within the Empire, Lloyd George already having promised the unionists that partition would be implemented.

Sinn Féin refused to participate unless there was an open agenda with the right to recommend independence and that political status was given to Irish prisoners in Lewes and Aylesbury.

These demands were refused and both Sinn Féin and Labour boycotted the Convention.

On 10 June, at Beresford Place, beside Liberty Hall in Dublin, a protest meeting was held, demanding political status for Irish prisoners. It was addressed by Cathal Brugha and Count Plunkett, victor in the North Roscommon by-election. The British authorities banned the meeting and arrested Plunkett and Brugha. Amid clashes between the crowd and the police, Dublin Metropolitan Police Inspector Mills died after he was struck on the head with a hurley.

On 15 June 1917, in the House of Commons in London, Coalition Cabinet member Andrew Bonar Law, leader of the Tories, announced a general

The streets were thronged as the prisoners were carried in triumph and receptions for them were held all over the country he was glad to return to “a rebel Cork, a republican Cork and an Irish Cork”.

‘Con(vict) 12’ arrived in Ireland the next day, 18 June, and received an equally tumultuous welcome in Dublin.

Waiting for her was her comrade Dr Kathleen Lynn with her car – the same one she had used in Easter Week. Con greeted the crowds from the open car and the Irish Citizen Army led a parade through the streets to Liberty Hall.

While the British Cabinet thought the Convention and the releases would win them political credit, the tumultuous welcome given to the prisoners when they returned to Ireland demonstrated that “all had changed, changed utterly”.

The general amnesty took effect in June 1917, 100 years ago this month.

June / Meitheamh 2017

www.anphoblacht.com

21

Rogha na Fraince idir Rud Deistineach agus Arrachtach BHÍ osna faoisimh i measc na ndíograiseóirí Eorpacha nuair a d’eirigh le Emmanuel Macron an bua a fháil i dtoghchán uachtaránacht na Fraince.

Ach is fiú smaoineamh faoi cén cineál duine é Macron, is cén cineál polaitíochta atá aige.

Ní fear den lár é, mar a deir RTÉ, ach fear den eite dheis i bhfad amach. Ní faisisteach ná ciníoch é ach fear a chreideann go láidir i saoirse an mhargaidh is nach ceart aon shrianta a bheith ar rachmas.

Nua-liobrálach is fear mór domhandaithe is ea é.

Maidir leis an Eoraip, tá sé tugtha ar fad don dluthphairtiu is mó idir na ballstait, agus ag moladh anois féin gur chóir treisiú ar na hiarrachtaí le Aontas Bancaerachta a chur ar bun, tuilleadh cumhachtaí a bhaint ó rialtaisi bhallstáit agus an lár a threisiú.

Is ait mar sin gur chuir rialtas Bhaile Átha Cliath fáilte chómh fial sin roimhe nuair a mhaígh sé go hoscailte go bhfuil sé ag iarraidh aon-choras cánach a bheith ann san Eoraip, coras nach gceadóidh don tír seo socraithe dár gcuid féin nó rátaí cánach dár gcuid féin a chur chun cinn.

Sea, má éiríonn leis beidh deire leis an bpolasaí cánach sin a deir an rialtas faoi gur bunchloch fhorbairt eacnamaíoch na tíre seo í.

Ar ndóigh in ainneóin na n-osnachaí faoisimh ag na heorafanaicigh, ní raibh gach einne a thaobhaigh

IN PICTURES

EOIN Ó MURCHÚ le Macron ag taobhu lena dhearcadh i leith na hEorpa.

Deir foinsí Francacha gur vótáil 60% da lucht tacaíochta ar a shon ar mhaithe le vótail i gcoinne Mharine Le Pen. Tá iarrachtai móra déanta aicise oidhreacht an fhaisisteachais sa bhFronta Náisiúnta a chealú, ach ní dhearna sí aon iarracht a dual sa seineafóibe, san ioslámafóibe agus sa gciníochas frith-Mhoslamach a cheilt nó a mhaolú.

Ceaptar gur vótail trian de lucht tacaíochta Jean-Luc Melenchon, fear na heite clé, di, gur staon trian eile agus gur thug an trian deiridh vóta drogallach do Mhacron.

Sí an teist anois ná cén chaoi a n-éireóidh le lucht tacaíochta Mhacron sna toghcháin phairlaiminte i mi Iúil, mar faoi lathair níl oiread is teachta amhain aige ann. Teist freisin do Le Pen agus don Chlé.

Cheana tá ceardchumannaigh agus díograíseóirí clé 3 Emmanuel Macron – i mbun agóide i gcoinne Mhacron. Ní léeir fós mar nua-liobráalach den eite dheis i bhfad amach ó thaobh sin nár lig na hEorpaigh a gcuid osnachaí faoisimh ró-luath. na heacnamaíochta dhe

photos@anphoblacht.com

5 Sinn Féin's Michelle O'Neill MLA and Senator Niall Ó Donnghaile at the Balmoral Show

5 Sinn Féin Dáil Health spokesperson Louise O’Reilly TD with Margaret Martin (Director of Women's Aid), Fiona Ryan (CEO of SONAS) and Sinn Féin Housing spokesperson Eoin Ó Broin TD outside Buswell’s Hotel in Dublin at the launch of a new ‘Domestic Violence Accommodation’ policy document

5 More than 10,000 people turned out in Dublin's Phoenix Park for Pieta House’s annual 'Darkness Into Light' fundraising and awareness event to coincide with others in 150 locations in Ireland and across the world, with more than 150,000 people in total taking part

22 June / Meitheamh 2017

www.anphoblacht.com

Another Europe is possible Treo eile don Eoraip

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

European Council needs to recognise importance of protecting Good Friday Agreement THE European Council needs to recognise the importance of protecting the Good Friday Agreement, MEP Martina Anderson (Ireland North) has said.

She said it is vital that the Good Friday Agreement is protected in full during the upcoming Brexit negotiations between the EU and the British Government at Westminster.

The Conference of Presidents of the European Parliament has established a steering group on this and Martina is the representative on the body for the GUE/NGL group of 52 MEPs. The group is chaired by Guy Verhofstadt, the European Parliament’s chief negotiator on Brexit, and includes representatives of all the major groups in the European Parliament.

It has been working to inform the guidelines

‘The European Parliament has already passed a joint resolution which calls for no hardening of the Border’ for the Brexit negotiations adopted at a Special European Council meeting.

Martina Anderson said: “I have been focused, in particular, on making the other members of the steering group aware of the unique position of the North, the fact that the majority of people voted to remain in the EU,

and the disastrous impact Brexit would have on the island of Ireland.

“The European Parliament has already passed a joint resolution which calls for no hardening of the Border, recognises the unique situation of the North and, crucially, calls for the protection of the Good Friday Agreement in all its parts.

“Through the Conference of Presidents Steering Group, I have been building support for the Good Friday Agreement, particularly in the face of the attempts to dismantle and undermine the Agreement by the British Government and the DUP, as well as garnering support for the case for the North to secure ‘Designated Special Status Within the EU’.

“The European Council now needs to recognise the importance of protecting the Good Friday Agreement.”

EU should challenge Israel over Palestine power shortages

shortages in Palestine and the suffering of the Palestinian people.

“Schools, hospitals and health services cannot operate properly in Palestine as a result of crippling power shortages brought about by Israeli actions.

“This is adding to the growing humanitarian problems the Palestinian people face on a daily basis.

“The international community, and the European Union in particular, have a responsibility to help the Palestinian people.

“I am calling for this gas pipeline deal to be reviewed in light of the power shortages in Palestine.”

Ní Riada call on Youth Guarantee supported by EP Education Committee

A DRAFT OPINION by GUE/NGL’s Liadh Ní Riada MEP for better-resourced public education systems across the EU and a revision of the Youth Guarantee Scheme and the Youth Employment Initiative was passed at a vote in the Parliament’s Committee on Culture and Education on 4 May. The Irish MEP had already voiced concern that the 2.5% cuts in investment for educa-

MARTINA ANDERSON has called on the EU to review a gas pipeline deal with Israel after serious power shortages in Palestine.

The Irish MEP said the gas pipeline deal recently agreed by Cyprus, Greece and Italy will do nothing to address the serious power

International community and EU have a responsibility to help the Palestinian people

Liadh Ní Riada MEP

EU must ensure a funding increase for education and training or risk social exclusion 5 Martina Anderson MEP, Mary Lou McDonald TD and Michelle O'Neill MLA meet with GUE/NGL Group Leader Gabi Zimmer at the EU Parliament in Strasbourg to discuss Brexit and EU direction

Commission leave to help curb gambling addiction should be sought IRELAND has the third-highest gambling losses per head in the world, Lynn Boylan MEP has said, urging the Irish Government to seek a derogation from the EU Commission to enact measures designed to help curb gambling addiction before it signs off on draft legislation to go before the Dáil.

The Public Health Institute estimates that Ireland could have as many as 40,000 problem gamblers with gambling among adolescents 2-3 times higher than adults.

Some 50% of gambling losses in Ireland are through online gambling.

The Dáil’s Gambling Control Bill was first published in 2013 and legislation is now

promised in the next 12 months but we do not need to wait for the legislation to introduce interim measures, the Dublin MEP said.

Although online gambling across the EU is governed by internal market rules, there is scope for a derogation to allow for member states to enact measures that are designed to help curb gambling addiction, she said.

“This is not about banning gambling and it is not about calling for draconian measures,” the Dublin MEP emphasised, “but it is about ensuring that those who do have gambling problems get the support they need and are not vulnerable to online exploitation by betting operators.”

tion and training between 2010 and 2014 have seriously undermined equality and social inclusion across the EU as part of the debate on the ‘EU Action for Sustainability’ motion for the 2030 Development Agenda.

Additionally, a revision of the youth-related initiative is badly needed in order to promote the creation of new high-quality jobs and decent social protection for young people in the EU, Liadh said.

Commenting after the vote, Ní Riada said that, although she was pleased with the result, much more investment is needed: “Opinions, as we all know, need to be short and direct. We decided, when drafting this opinion, that we would focus on the fourth Sustainable Development Goal of the 2030 Development Agenda, in the European policy framework.

“Of course, if the opportunity was made available to me, I would have broadened the scope of the opinion but space and procedure would not permit that.”

June / Meitheamh 2017

www.anphoblacht.com

Matt Carthy

Martina Anderson

Liadh Ní Riada

Lynn Boylan

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www.guengl.eu

are MEPs and members of the GUE/NGL Group in the European Parliament

‘Shell companies’ cost EU budgets €100bn to €230bn a year A NEW REPORT commissioned by the European Parliament’s Panama Papers inquiry committee shows that ‘shell companies’ cost the budgets of EU member states up to €237billion per year, Matt Carthy MEP has said.

Speaking in Brussels at the presentation of the report to the committee, the Ireland North West MEP said:

“These findings show the high cost to governments across the EU of permitting these schemes that funnel money offshore. The schemes directly and very significantly reduce the amount of funds available to state authorities for spending on public services.”

The report estimates that the schemes revealed in the Panama Papers cost the budgets of EU

member states somewhere between €109 billion and €237billion every year.

“This is money that should be received by governments as revenue and then made available to fund vital public services such as hospitals and schools.

“The report looks at just one example of what these funds could be used for if they weren’t

‘The billions funneled into tax havens could be used to support an additional 3.5million jobs when we still have 20million people out of work across the EU’ diverted to offshore tax havens – employment.

The billions funneled out of EU member states and into tax havens could be used to support an additional 3.5million jobs at a time when we still have 20million people out of work across the EU.”

MAT

**

** [PU

END

Matt Carthy MEP

between the European Commission and tens of thousands of corporate lobbies in Brussels.”

The Ireland North West MEP continued: “This paper is not about harnessing globalisation. It is about pushing it forward as the only solution to all of the EU’s problems.

“It is a wrong-headed approach and one which is in complete contrast to the vision of a progressive and social Europe,” Matt Carthy said.

Euro Court rules against silencing debate on TTIP MATT CARTHY has welcomed a landmark decision by the European Court of Justice in May which ruled against the attempts of the European Commission to silence debate on the controversial proposed TTIP trade deal between the EU and USA. The European Court of Justice annulled a decision by the European Commission in 2014 that rejected a European Citizens' Initiative entitled “Stop-TTIP” which secured over 3million signatories.

The European Commission had rejected the Stop-TTIP European Citizens' Initiative, saying that preparatory decisions (such as decisions

LYN [HE

[PU LYN

EU vision contrary to progressive and social Europe A PAPER by the European Commission on the future of the EU published in May shows that those people driving the EU project have their “heads in the sand”, Matt Carthy MEP has said.

The Commission document is a follow-on to a White Paper on ‘The Future of the EU’ issued in March which envisaged various future scenarios for the European Union.

Matt Carthy said that the European Commission’s ‘Reflection Paper on Harnessing Globalisation’ reveals “a deeply disturbing lack of vision” by those steering the EU project to countenance the wide-ranging changes to the EU that are an urgent necessity.

“The EU Commission is blindly adhering to a neoliberal ideology which makes its aspirations for a global rule book to harness globalisation, particularly in light of the unregulated relationship

JUN

‘A victory for millions of citizens who have campaigned against TTIP and CETA’ to open international trade negotiations) did not fall within the rules laid down.

Matt Carthy described the judgement as “a victory for millions of citizens who have campaigned against TTIP and CETA over the last three years”.

Lynn Boylan MEP launches ‘Boycott Israel Bag’ GUE/NGL MEP Lynn Boylan has launched a shopping bag reminding consumers how they can do their bit for Palestinian human rights by boycotting Israeli goods.

The “I check the label. Do you?” bag urges

customers to use their purchasing power by avoiding goods from Israel and its illegal colonial settlements in Palestine.

The bags are free of charge from Lynn’s office. Enquiries to lynn.boylan@sinnfein.ie.

Ireland drops 5 places in World Press Freedom Index PUBLISHED every year since 2002 by Reporters Without Borders, the World Press Freedom Index is an important tool for measuring the health of journalism and press freedom throughout countries around the world.

The Paris-based NGO, which has consultant status at the United Nations, issued its World Press Freedom Index for 2017 on 26 April.

It investigated freedom of media and journalists in 180 countries and found democracies, as well as dictatorships, had increasingly clamped down on press freedom.

In its chapter on Ireland, the report states: “The highly concentrated nature of media ownership in Ireland poses a major threat to press freedom.”

In outlining the problem it went on to point out an example of the concentration of ownership in that “Independent News and Media (INM) controls 40% of the daily and Sunday newspaper market”.

Lynn Boylan said: “An open and diverse media is crucial to the health of any democracy. We need a media that holds those in powerful positions to account, one that seeks the truth and ensures that the public has access to the truth.

“For some time now, there has been a litany of reports highlighting the dangers and problems that the concentration of media ownership is having in Ireland and how it is damaging our democracy.”

24 June / Meitheamh 2017

www.anphoblacht.com

Stand up for Irish fishing communities and force the EU’s hand before there are no communities left to stand up for

If Europe won’t protect our fisheries,

the Irish Government must SINN FÉIN MEP Liadh Ní Riada has just been appointed by the GUE/ NGL group in the European Parliament as their Brexit Rapporteur for Fisheries.

The appointment is a reflection of the Ireland South MEP’s work on the EU’s Fisheries Committee, a role she has been highly active in.

As well as holding public meetings

BY LIADH NÍ RIADA IT’S TELLING IN ITSELF that, just weeks since the EU’s first Brexit summit at the end of April and almost a year after the referendum of 23 June 2016, it’s already something of a cliché to point out that the British Government not only had no plan for Brexit but not even a clear understanding of what it means.

What’s more shocking is the almost cavalier attitude of the Irish Government to Brexit and the effect it will have on Ireland, North and South.

While they have taken something of a half-baked wait-and-see approach to issues such as a ‘hard Border’ and the status of the North, this looks

As a small island nation, fishing is an integral part of the fabric of communities up and down our coast – and an €891million industry that directly employs 11,000 people positively proactive when compared to their attitude to the potentially devastating effects of Brexit on the Irish fishing industry.

In April, I met Scottish Government Brexit Minister Michael Russell in Cork for an insight into how discussions between Scotland, Westminster, Ireland and the EU were going.

His frankness and honesty in discussing issues which have so far been shrouded in half-truths and ambiguity was refreshing.

When I raised the issue of how the main stakeholders were approaching the issue of the Irish fishing industry his response was to the point.

“It hasn’t even been brought up,” he responded.

While I am not surprised that the British Tory Government at Westminster has little regard for Irish fishermen, I find it unsettling in the extreme that the Irish Government is not demanding more prominence for what is going to be an extremely complex issue.

in coastal communities around the country on fisheries issues, she is the first MEP to facilitate a meeting in Brussels directly between representatives of the Irish fishing industry and the body that advises the European Commission on fisheries issues.

Writing exclusively for An Phoblacht this month, Liadh outlines

There will, of course, be those who will baulk at this criticism and claim that there are two years of negotiations to go. This is a depressingly blinkered approach to what will be one of the most difficult issues of the negotiations. Hurriedly concocting a hodgepodge fisheries policy mid-negotiation at some unspecified point down the line will spell disaster for Irish fishing communities. The fact that the Irish Government has yet to raise the issue (even as part of an overview or setting out of their priorities) has coastal communities rightly concerned.

Irish fishing is an €891million industry that directly employs 11,000 people, mostly in coastal regions, and many more across the country in knock-on enterprises.

It is also, as a small island nation, an integral part of the fabric of communities up and down our coast, with traditions and skills being handed down through generations.

Brexit poses a two-pronged threat to the Irish fishing industry.

the danger posed to the Irish fishing industry by Brexit, what needs to be done to prevent disaster and beyond Brexit, and why the EU needs major reform of its fishing policy.

If traditional fishing communities are to survive, the EU must establish proper technical and legal distinctions of small boats from large vessels

Firstly, Tory Prime Minister Theresa May’s ‘Fortress Britain’ approach to Brexit means they have already signalled their intentions to pull up the drawbridge on British waters and simply expel all non-British boats from their territory.

Given the close proximity of Irish and British waters, not to mention current informal agreements around fishing North and South, an average of 36% Irish landings are taken from waters that Britain claims.

If Irish boats are barred from these waters it will not only have a huge effect on those livelihoods but will also put a significant extra strain on Irish stock as that 36% will then have to be taken from an increasingly crowded pool.

And what of Carlingford Lough and Lough Foyle?

Britain currently claims the entirety of both bodies. Brexit forces these territorial disputes to a head. Could we end up with the ludicrous situation in which fishermen in Carlingford and Greencastle would be violating international laws

5 Scottish Government Brexit Minister Michael Russell in Cork was to the point on Brexit and fishing

by simply taking to the water on their doorstep?

It may sound preposterous but, given the Tory attitude to these negotiations, that is exactly where an ineffectual or indifferent Irish Government will take us.

Secondly, and even more devastatingly, we face the possibility of Brexit pushing the European boats currently in British waters into Irish waters.

A post-Brexit Ireland would have more than 33% of the most productive fishing grounds in the EU. Where else would those boats want to go?

This is simply unthinkable and would lead to the destruction of not only the Irish fishing industry but could quite possibly have an irreparable effect on Irish fishing stocks.

This must be an absolute red line for the Irish Government. If Britain exercises full control of its Exclusive Economic Zone (a sea zone prescribed by the UN over which a state has special rights),

It’s unsettling that the Irish Government is not demanding more prominence for our fisheries, industries, jobs and communities the Irish Government must insist that Ireland simply cannot bear the brunt of foreign fleets displaced from British waters.

If indigenous fishing industries are to have any hope of surviving then the Common Fisheries Policy must be revised. Crucially, International Transferable Quotas and relative stability have to be reviewed.

As it stands, pre-Brexit, a mere 5% of the total catch in Irish waters is processed here.

Around 1.2million tonnes of fish are caught annually in Irish waters yet only some 20% of the total catch is allocated to us; the rest of the 80% usually goes abroad.

Out of the 250,000 tonnes that goes to Irish vessels, just 50,000 tonnes are actually processed in Ireland, and it is from processing where the value is added.

Post-Brexit, who knows what those numbers will be? The only thing we can be assured of is that they won’t be better Insisting that vessels which land all their Atlantic

June / Meitheamh 2017

www.anphoblacht.com

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5 Legislation needs to take a step in the right direction in regulating industrial floating factories

catches in Irish waters must process in Ireland would be a start.

The damage foreign boats being pushed into Irish waters would do to the fishing industry here is also just one aspect of that threat.

The fact is such a move could threaten the very sustainability of Irish fishing stocks.

Around 58% of fish stock that is taken from waters claimed by Britain is by non-British vessels, some 650,000 tonnes annually.

If that extra burden is put on Ireland it will not only kill our indigenous industry but could very well turn Irish waters into a barren dead-zone in a generation.

Domestically, we must also ensure that there is a fairer distribution of existing quotas. The reality is that quotas are currently skewed in favour of

factories that have been catastrophic for local communities and their small fleets, marine biodiversity and stocks.

The Common Fisheries Policy, Relative Stability and its ITQ system has enabled governments to auction off fish to multinational predators operating these colossal factory ships pushing out ordinary small fishermen.

If traditional fishing communities are to survive, the EU must establish proper technical and legal distinctions of small boats from large vessels. The

More often than not, ‘super trawlers’ are not inspected properly and blind eyes are turned while our own smaller fleets face the full weight of the law

The EU must stop tacitly backing multinational ‘super trawler’ operators at the expense of ordinary fishing a small number of wealthier, more high-profile ports. If the industry is to survive right around our coast then we need to see some flexibility in quotas when it comes to distribution.

While regulations are important, the current implementation of the penalty point system needs serious review. It seems to be relentless in its targeting of indigenous, small-scale fishermen, lumbering them with excessive penalties for relatively minor infractions in many cases.

Another major factor that is contributing to the threat posed to the Irish industry and environment is the continued impunity that super trawlers are operating with.

Beyond Brexit, the EU must allow member states to have an open and free discussion on how these vessels operate in their waters.

Crucially, the EU must stop tacitly backing multinational ‘super trawler’ operators at the expense of ordinary fishing communities. These destructive behemoths are wreaking unchecked havoc on coastal communities from Cork to Donegal.

5 Vessels which land all their Atlantic catches in Irish waters should process in Ireland Let’s not pretend we don’t all know what’s the views of member states? going on here.

Yet the European Council seems determined to Super trawlers and wealthy, large-scale indus- reject any changes to regulation surrounding them. trial vessel owners have benefited from a cosy During the recent debate on the characterisarelationship with national authorities, many of tion and definition of fishing vessels I put forward whom are working with these powerful entities a number of modest amendments that were whose significant business interests give them supported by the Committee but shamefully unaccountable political sway. opposed by the Council.

The fact is there are major flaws in legislation More often than not they are not inspected properly and blind eyes are turned while our that do not properly distinguish between smallown smaller fleets face the full weight of the law. scale, traditional and artisanal fisheries and largeWe know they have a dubious history when scale industrialised fisheries.

My proposals would have balanced out some it comes to obeying regulations around quotas, of these glaring inequalities, such as taking into catches and dumping.

We know all too well the environmental and account other vessel size attributes besides vessel economic damage they do to the territories they length, their social role in coastal communities, enter with nets that can easily ensnare more the ecological impact of their gears, fishing and fuel capacity, processing ability and output, and than a dozen jumbo jets.

Australia has made moves to ban these the economics of the enterprise. monsters outright. Shouldn’t the EU at least be Legislation needs to take a step in the right talking about the possibility; at least be discussing direction in regulating these industrial floating

de facto EU policy of supporting these multinational giants at the expense of ordinary fishing communities must come to an end.

If the EU won’t act then the Irish Government must.

They must use every available resource at their disposal to stop, search and inspect these 'super trawlers' every time they enter Irish waters. Let it be known that as soon as they are in our territory they will come under the most rigorous watch and relentless scrutiny.

Stand up for Irish fishing communities and force the EU’s hand before there are no communities left to stand up for.

As GUE/NGL Brexit Rapporteur for Fisheries I will be reporting to a significant block of MEPs from across 13 countries and I promise to use whatever influence I can bring to bear to stand up for our fishermen, our environment and our coastal communities.

If the Irish Government would display a similar intent (rather than letting Ireland take a back seat in these talks and just hoping that the Tories will be reasonable), perhaps those communities could rest a little easier.

26 June / Meitheamh 2017

ROBBIE SMYTH

The republican roots of the

www.anphoblacht.com

r o t c e s c i l b u Irish p

WHEN I GET ON A BUS in the morning I see the service as a tangible manifestation of the thinking of Fintan Lalor, Wofe Tone, the 1916 leaders and the first Sinn Féin government of 1919. It might seem silly when you see this written down but this is your bus, your public sector, your right to the sovereignty of the nation.

I also see the public sector in Ireland rooted in the philosophies of the United Irishmen, the Fenians, the 1916 Proclamation and the 1919 Democratic Programme.

The structures of the Irish public sector were partially formed and shaped in the 20th century by the ideas and struggles of these people and groups.

Its botches and fiascos in the intervening years can be attributed in part to a failure to remember the principles that drove the struggle for independence.

At a basic level these principles were about the creation of institutions and services for the people which were equal and just in their operation.

It meant the building of a public service that would promote the welfare ERTS THE 1916 PROCLAMATION ASS of all.

Wolfe Tone highlighted the evils he saw in the 1790s, writing: “We have no national government; we are ruled by Englishmen, and thus servants of Englishmen, whose object is the interest of another country, whose instrument is corruption; whose strength is the weakness of Ireland.”

Fintan Lalor wrote repeatedly of his thinking on the scope of an independent Irish government and administration and on the need for a radical

‘the right of the people of Ireland to the ownership of Ireland’ and ‘declares its resolve to pursue the happiness and prosperity of the whole nation and of all its parts’

reform of how Ireland was run.

In an 1848 article in The Irish Felon, Lalor wrote his classic synopsis of this, propounding: “Ireland her own, and all therein, from the sod to the sky.”

Surely this also now means buses, broadband, hospital beds and classrooms.

This thinking is returned to in the Fenian proclamation of 1867 that asserts: “We have suffered centuries of outrage, enforced poverty, and bitter

misery. Our rights and liberties have been trampled on by an alien aristocracy, who treating us as foes, usurped our lands, and drew away from our unfortunate country all material riches.”

The proclamation asserts the Irish people as “the real owners of the soil” who “never lost the memory and hope of a national existence”.

The 1916 Proclamation asserts “the right of the people of Ireland to the ownership of Ireland” and “declares its resolve to pursue the happiness and

Infrastructure and services on the cheap IT’S EASY to be negative about the public sector in Ireland but recent studies by the Institute of Public Administration (IPA) show a more vibrant, dynamic and effective public service than what some might think. The Irish public service ranks fourth in the EU for the quality of its public administration, though the IPA found that “at 39% of GDP in 2014, Ireland’s public spending is significantly below the European average” and the 26 Counties has the lowest level of public procurement in the EU. There are considerably fewer public sector workers and in many cases their wages have been cut. Between 2009 and 2014, the total number of public

sector workers fell by 10% and the total Exchequer wage bill fell by 20%.

Public sector workers in Ireland make up 15% of the labour force. In the EU,

The Irish public service ranks fourth in the EU for the quality of its public administration the percentage ranges from 13% in Spain to 32% in Denmark.

The scale of what our limited public sector achieves is impressive.

Between 2014 to 2016, 1.2million

5 IPA found that Ireland’s public spending 'significantly below European average'

people attended emergency departments, 3.2million people were seen as out-patients, 293,000 ambulances were dispatched to answer 999 emergency calls, and fire brigades attended 37,800 incidents.

13,000 homes were delivered across all the social housing programmes. To put this into perspective, the number of social housing provided by private sector social schemes in 2016 came in at 37!

This was all done in an economy which has the lowest level of public procurement in the EU. The scale of cuts in public transport funding are startling. Public service funding for Bus Átha Cliath

June / Meitheamh 2017

www.anphoblacht.com

27

E OF THE FIRST DÁIL

1919 DEMOCRATIC PROGRAMM

5 Wolfe Tone and Fintan Lalor

‘The nation’s sovereignty extends not only to all men and women of the nation but to all its material possessions, the nation’s soil and all its resources, all the wealth and all the wealth-producing processes within the nation’

5 The LUAS light rail system wouldn't have got started without public money

We need to celebrate the public sector

5 The state should stand with the First Dáil 'in accordance with the principles of liberty, equality, and justice for all'

prosperity of the whole nation and of all its parts”.

The 1919 Democratic Programme of the First Dáil gives the first clear road map to actually bring the Irish public sector into being. It declares: “The nation’s sovereignty extends not only to all men and women of the nation but to all its material possessions, the nation’s soil and all its resources, all the wealth and all the wealth-producing processes within the nation.”

Specifically, the Programme, promises to “promote the development of the nation’s resources, to increase the productivity of its soil, to exploit its

mineral deposits, peat bogs, and fisheries, its waterways and harbours, in the interests and for the benefit of the Irish people”.

It also commits to “adopt all measures necessary for the recreation and invigoration of our industries, and to ensure their being developed on the most beneficial and progressive co-operative and industrial lines”.

Perhaps the most crucial lines in the Programme’s text is the declaration: “We desire our country to be ruled in accordance with the principles of liberty, equality, and justice for all, which alone can secure permanence of Government

in the willing adhesion of the people.”

So when we look at the issues confronting our bus drivers and the cherry-picking of profitable routes for the private sector, when we think about wage cuts being forced on public sector workers, when we think about an underfunded public hospital sector, with patients on trolleys, with hundreds of thousands of people waiting for an appointment, when we see another round of privatisation proposals, for me it is time to stop and think about the “right of the people to the ownership of Ireland” and how that principle holds up in the Ireland of today.

The scale of what our limited public sector achieves is impressive has fallen by 32.6% since 2008. Bus Éireann had a 19.4% cut. In Iarnród Éireann, the cut was 45.8%. With the recession ending, the number of bus journeys on Bus Átha Cliath and Bus Éireann has increased in recent years but the funding hasn't increased to match demand. A 2013 Dáil question revealed that services comparable to Bus Éireann across Europe receive a subvention between 32% and 70% of costs. The Bus Éireann subvention that year was 35%, showing Ireland at the bottom of the public service funding league.

5 Emergency services – public services – are often taken for granted

ON THE DARKEST, coldest winter mornings there is for me no more welcome a sight than the distinctive lights of an approaching Bus Éireann coach. Most days I don’t think too much about the logistics of the journey, of all the workers involved in getting me to where I'm going: the drivers, mechanics, cleaners, administrators and managers who get 1,300 buses on the road every day. Across the island this month, upwards of 2.9million people are going to work each day. Many of them, like me, are dependent on public transport such as buses and trains, and Dublin’s LUAS light rail lines. Even those lucky enough to have a car might not think of the huge public investments that make it all happen.

Waiting for the bus, I can’t ignore the sounds of the nearby Dublin Airport, taking the first several thousand of that day’s passengers. In 2016, 27.9million people passed through the airport.

The runway and terminals are run as a commercial business now but it was state investment of taxpayers’ money that made the airport possible. It was a green field when the state began to build and now it is a glittering, profitable private sector jewel. The bus crosses under the M50, the total cost of which was over €1.5billion of taxpayers’ money over the decades it took to get it from the drawing board to completion. Along the M50’s periphery you might notice the electricity switching stations, built again with your taxes that make sure the lights are always on and link the city to the power stations near and far.

You might notice the water towers, again a public sector investment:

€2.7million for each one. They are vital to maintain water pressure in a growing city.

Some days I pass through Ballymun, rebuilt with €942million Government (i.e. taxpayers' money), private sector developers unwilling for years to take on the massive reconstruction needed to save this community. Further down the arterial road towards the city centre is Dublin City University, a state-run, taxpayer initiative that has brought third-level education permanently to the city’s northside. Later I go past the Mater Hospital, the massive public wards and theatres dwarfing the dependent private hospital by its side. There are other examples of our public sector at work. Across the island 1,190,701 children attend primary and secondary schools, built and run mostly by the state. There are 243,450 people at universities and colleges (again built by the state), North and South. We could go and list the hospitals, housing projects, economic development centres, ports, roads, parks, libraries and museums, all built and often run with public money – our money.

Ireland as we know it couldn’t function day to day without the infrastructure and services provided by the state but do we value enough the scale of what has been achieved to keep the lights on, to have the bus arrive on time? We need to value our public sector, to protect the assets we have paid for and, most importantly, to ensure that those working in it have a fair wage, decent working conditions, the respect of management and the acknowledgement of us who use the services.

5 The new Mater Hospital and Dublin Airport – built on public investment

28 June / Meitheamh 2017

www.anphoblacht.com

WILLIAM ROONEY (LIAM Ó MAOLRUANAIDH), 1873 - 1901

‘The real founder of Sinn Féin’

BY DAVID CONNOLLY THE United Irishman newspaper of 11 May 1901 dedicated five pages to the death of William Rooney.

The lead editorial opened: “The Davis of the national revival is dead – dead in the spring of his life – a martyr to his passionate love of our unhappy country.”

The comparison to Thomas Davis was appropriate in that Rooney had dedicated himself to promoting the ideals and beliefs of Davis and, to a large extent, had modelled his writings and activism on the approach adopted by Davis and the Young Irelanders. Rooney, however, although now little known, was a more important figure in the development of separatism and republican-

Rooney was a more important figure in the development of separatism and republicanism ism in that he helped to build the capacity of the broad movement necessary to achieve these ideals.

The attendance at his funeral of over 500 representatives from 35 different organisations and groups active in the cultural, social and political life of Ireland at that time was testament to his importance and centrality to the independence movement in the early 20th century.

He had been active in establishing and developing many of the groups and campaigns whose representatives followed the cortège from his family home near to Croke Park and Fairview Park, in Leinster Avenue, North Strand, Dublin, to Glasnevin Cemetery on Wednesday 8 May 1901. These included Conradh na Gaedilghe, Inghinidhe na hÉireann, the Celtic Literary Society, the GAA, the Irish Socialist Republican Party and Cumann na nGaedheal.

Many of Rooney’s comrades from the secret Irish Republican Brotherhood also attended under the various banners.

Rooney was born in October 1873 in a tenement in Mabbot Street, in Dublin’s ‘Monto’ district. He left school at the age of 12 but continued nighttime education to complete the Junior Cert. He was employed as a clerk in the Midland Great Western Railway Company until his early death at 27 years old. His father had been involved in the Fenian uprising in 1867 and was a leader of the veterans' Old Guard Union.

Shortly after he left school, Rooney became involved in the Young Ireland Society. In 1887 he met with the veteran Fenian, John O’Leary, on his return from exile and was profoundly influenced by his ideas of a new cultural and literary revival as the way forward.

He also met Arthur Griffith and other activists, who formed the basis for a range of organisations and a number of campaigning initiatives over the following decade.

In 1893, Rooney established the Celtic Literary Society in his own home and this grew to be one of the most important early influences for many young activists who subsequently participated in the 1916 Rising.

Rooney, Griffith and others developed their writing skills through these literary societies. This facilitated the establishment of The United Irishman newspaper in April 1899, where Griffith was appointed editor at the suggestion of Rooney.

Rooney wrote patriotic poems, ballads and political and literary articles throughout his

5 Veteran Fenian John O’Leary

life and was regularly published in nationalist newspapers such as United Ireland, the Belfastbased Shan Van Vocht and, for the first two years, he wrote a significant part of the weekly United Irishman under no fewer than 12 pseudonyms.

The attendance at his funeral of over 500 representatives from 35 different organisations was testament to his centrality to the independence movement in the early 20th century His Poems and Ballads and Prose Writings were published after his death, funded by public subscription.

Eoin MacNéill invited Rooney to join the Gaelic League on its foundation. He had become fluent in the Irish language and an organiser for the League. Rooney was also a prime mover in the setting up of the 1798 Centenary Committee.

He travelled the country, promoting the initiative and speaking on public platforms, often alongside Maud Gonne, including at the major demonstration in Dublin for the Wolfe Tone memorial in March 1898 where he spoke in Irish.

He was active in the pro-Boer Irish Transvaal Committee and was a founder member of Cumann na nGaedhael in November 1900, which evolved to form Sinn Féin.

In the decade after the revolutionary period, the vital contribution of Rooney to the emergence of Sinn Féin was regularly acknowledged by many of those involved, including Brian O’Higgins, veteran of the Rising and President of Sinn Féin in the

5 William Rooney, from 'The United Irishman', December 1901

1930s, who referred to him as “the real founder of Sinn Féin”. Arising from the bitterness of the Civil War, sometimes the preference for Rooney was to denigrate the legacy of Arthur Griffith.

Michael Collins, however, declared: “Rooney spoke as a prophet. He prepared the way and foresaw the victory.”

Undoubtedly, Rooney’s ideas, analysis and organisational approach helped to shape and influence the activists who established and built Sinn Féin and inspired the core principles upon which the party was founded. Now, as Sinn Féin reclaims its rightful place as the pre-eminent political movement across the island of Ireland, it is important to re-examine and re-evaluate the writings and activities of William Rooney which helped to set the foundations for the party, both for their contemporary relevance and continued inspiration.

June / Meitheamh 2017

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29

I nDíl Chuimhne 3 June 1974: Volunteer Michael GAUGHAN (Parkhurst Prison), England.

3 June 1991: Volunteer Tony DORIS, Volunteer Lawrence McNALLY, Volunteer Pete RYAN, Tyrone Brigade.

4 June 1975: Volunteer Francis JORDAN, South Armagh Brigade.

4 June 1978: Volunteer Henry HEANEY, Long Kesh.

4 June 1991: Volunteer Danny McCAULEY, Tyrone Brigade.

5 June 1975: Volunteer Seán McKENNA, Monaghan Brigade.

5 June 1976: Colm MULGREW, Sinn Féin.

7 June 1987: Volunteer Margaret McARDLE, Belfast Brigade, 1st Battalion.

7 June 1990: Volunteer Seán BATESON, Long Kesh.

9 June 1979: Volunteer Peadar McELVANNA, South Armagh Brigade.

9 June 1983: Volunteer Dan TURLEY, Belfast Brigade, 1st Battalion.

10 June 1978: Volunteer Denis HEANEY, Derry Brigade.

11 June 1972: Fian Joseph

Life springs from death and from the graves of patriot men and women spring living nations PÁDRAIG PEARSE CAMPBELL, Fianna Éireann.

11 June 1997: Volunteer Patrick KELLY, Laois.

12 June 1993: Volunteer Michael MOTLEY, Laois.

21 June 1978: Volunteer Denis BROWN, Volunteer Jackie MAILEY,

FÓGRAÍ BHÁIS

Joe McElhaw Camlough, South Armagh JOE McELHAW passed away peacefully on 31 March, surrounded by his family, including his wife Judy.

Seán Hughes gave the oration at Joe’s funeral on Sunday 2 April.

Seán Hughes said: “It is a great honour for me to have been asked to give the oration at the graveside of my good friend and comrade, Joe McElhaw.

“South Armagh has lost a true republican stalwart and Camlough has lost one of its best-known and finest sons.”

Joe lived a long, exciting and eventful life.

Born in Camlough in 1930, along with his only sister, Maeve, Joe was raised by his parents Jack and Maggie, who had both been active in the Tan War. Their family home was burned down by the Black & Tans in 1920 so republicanism was engrained in every 5 The funeral of Joe McElhaw with his nephew Conor Murphy MLA taking part fabric of his family’s make-up.

Joe was an athletic young man with a huge zest for life and his sense of adventure took him to England and then on to America, where he joined the US Marines in the early 1950s.

In 1962, Joe returned to Camlough to run the family business, known as McElhaw’s pub. It became a hub of community and republican activity for decades to come.

“Some say it was the first advice centre in South Armagh,” Seán Hughes quipped.

On two occasions when republican prisoners escaped (from Newry courthouse in 1975 and Long Kesh in 1983), Joe McElhaw was the first person the prisoners made contact with when they made they made their way to South Armagh.

“And it is good to see Bik McFarlane here today,” Seán Hughes said.

In 1969 he met and married Judy the early 1970s he trained many IRA south of the Border.

Throughout Joe’s life he met many and it was around that time that Joe Volunteers.

In the years since then, Joe remained people and had many great friends joined with the nationalist people of the Six Counties when they took to a steadfast and loyal activist, partici- and comrades but none more so the streets to demand equality and pating in every single aspect of repub- than Raymond McCreesh who he was extremely proud of. He had a lican activity. civil rights.

In 1973, he was interned alongside his never-ending loyalty to Raymond and “That demand was faced down by RUC batons and British guns right old friend and comrade, Art McAlinden. the McCreesh family.

Joe defended the legitimacy and across the Six Counties, the IRA was On his release he set up the Seamus reborn and the defence of national- Steele Sinn Féin Cumann in Camlough, integrity of the republican struggle and ist and republican areas began,” Seán one of the first cumainn established the armed campaign with vigour, no matter where he was and no matter in South Armagh.

Hughes said.

He worked tirelessly within the Green what the circumstances.

Joe McElhaw immediately stepped Joe was one the corner stones on forward and played a key role along- Cross for the welfare of republican side a small cadre of comrades who prisoners and their families and he was which the Republican Movement in South Armagh was built. He will oversaw the regeneration of the IRA a regular visitor to the jails.

A decent and generous man, he be sadly missed by his friends and in South Armagh.

He put to good use the skills that he constantly helped and gave any assis- comrades, particularly in South Armagh acquired with the US Marines and in tance he could to comrades on the run but all across Ireland and beyond.

Volunteer Jim MULVENNA, Belfast Brigade, 3rd Battalion.

24 June 1974: Volunteers Gerard CRAIG, Volunteer David RUSSELL, Derry Brigade.

25 June 1973: Volunteers Patrick CARTY, Volunteer Seán LOUGHRAN, Tyrone Brigade; Volunteer Dermot CROWLEY, Cork Brigade.

Always remembered by the Republican Movement.

CORRIGAN, Kieran (‘Stan’). In proud and loving memory of our friend and

comrade Stan, whose anniversary occurs at this time. Never forgotten by the Halpenny, Worthington, Watters Sinn Féin Cumann, Dundalk.

McARDLE, John. In proud and loving memory of our friend and comrade John, whose anniversary occurs at this time. Never forgotten by the Halpenny, Worthington, Watters Sinn Féin Cumann, Dundalk.

All notices and obituaries should be sent to notices@ anphoblacht.com

» NOTICES All notices should be sent to: notices@anphoblacht.com There is no charge for I nDíl Chuimhne, Comhbhrón, etc. » 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.

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IN PICTURES

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5 Dublin Mid-West hunger strike vigil for the anniversary of Bobby Sands MP

5 Relatives of 1916 signatory Seán Mac Diarmada at Kiltyclogher, County Leitrim

5 Loughgall Martyrs 30th Anniversary Commemorative Parade on its way to the Republican Monument in Cappagh

30 June / Meitheamh 2017

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Arlene, Leo and who’s Saudi now?

SHANE ROSS OF ARABIA

SEÁN Mac BRÁDAIGH ARLENE FOSTER looked increasingly uncomfortable on BBC’s The View when repeatedly questioned by Mark Carruthers about possible connections between the DUP’s very expensive wraparound pro-Brexit ad in a free newspaper not distributed in the North and a former Saudi Arabia Intelligence figure with links to the Saudi royals.

The DUP leader tried and painfully failed to brush it as “a reheated story” (i.e. old news) by Sinn Féin. This was news to the openDemocracy investigators who are still unravelling the murky goings-on.

The View was another in a series of arrogant media displays by the DUP leader which (following her “crocodile” comments about the Irish language and sexist remarks summing up Michelle O’Neill as little more than “blonde”) marks out the former First Minister as Gregory ‘Yoghurt’ Campbell’s first reserve warm-up at DUP conference funfests.

4 Leo Varadkar – sign of a Tory

What is it with right-wing Irish politicians and the Saudi regime even with its legalised beheadings that so appall the Irish Government when carried out by Daesh/Islamic State?

There’s the DUP’s Brexit Metro imbroglio but, south of the Border, the Fine Gael Government is trying to draw a veil over another scandal.

Fine Gael in Government has resisted calls to reveal to the Irish public how it voted in the election which saw Saudi Arabia appointed to the UN Commission on the Status of Women.

This was a truly Orwellian moment.

In Saudi Arabia, women and men are forcibly segregated in most areas of public life. When this was inflicted on black people in South Africa, we called it apartheid and didn’t treat it as a normal state.

But when asked about the vote and the Irish Government’s attitude to Saudi Arabia, Government spokespeople were at pains not to upset the Saudi royal family. It’s none of your business, everyone else in the world outside of a privileged elite in the Fine Gael inner circle was effectively told.

Independent Alliance TDs Shane Ross and Finian McGrath were not happy. Transport & Sport Minister Ross was “demanding” answers.

“The idea that this could be carried out behind closed doors is an unacceptable convention,” Shane Ross snorted.

“We’re going to make it absolutely clear that we expect transparency – that’s why the Independent Alliance is in power.

“If he won’t answer, we’ll push it further and keep asking and asking until we get a satisfactory answer.”

The Independent Alliance TDs did get an answer – but were then told to keep it behind closed doors and not to tell the Irish public.

Is that why the Independent Alliance is in power?

5 Come on, Arlene – who exactly paid the Brexit bill?

agreement with Mick Barry of Solidarity (formerly AAA, the electoral wing of the Socialist Party), on RTÉ TV’s Claire Byrne Live.

Both men trenchantly opposed any referendum on a united Ireland. Understandable from a member of the Conservative & Unionist Party but from a self-proclaimed socialist who puts himself ‘in the tradition of James Connolly’?

Connolly was executed by the British for his efforts to establish a 32-county Irish Republic and wrote: “The British Government has no right in Ireland, never had any right in Ireland, and never can have any right in Ireland.”

Connolly condemned the idea of partition, warning that it would lead to “a carnival of reaction, both North and South, would set back the wheels of progress, would destroy the oncoming unity of the Irish labour movement and paralyse all advanced movements whilst it endured”.

Anyone on board for Mick Barry’s carnival of reaction?

FINE GAEL FRAUDS In the race for power in the wake of Enda Kenny’s resignation, arch-Thatcherite Leo Varadkar took a commanding lead among Fine Gael TDs in the first few days.

Leo is the man who (in 2008) suggested that unemployed immigrants be offered six months of benefits to return to where they came from!

As part of his bid to lead the Blueshirts, Varadkar the Impaler is running what one former social welfare inspector has described “a hate campaign” nominally targeting social welfare fraud.

It’s already the subject of a protest to the Advertising Complaints Authority over the use of very questionable figures to justify targeting jobless people.

Varadkar’s snitcher’s charter (#Rat4Leo) is a classic Thatcherite ploy. It focuses attention on the relatively small amounts of fraudulent activity among welfare recipients while distracting from the white-collar crime in the banking, property and

LOST LEADERS 5 Places for SNP and Plaid but no DUP or UUP

other business sectors that involves many multiples of the amount lost in social welfare fraud.

But that’s what they like in the Galway Tent and Dublin 4.

THE SOLIDARITY UNIONIST PARTY Another of Thatcher’s devotees, a card-carrying Tory, was seen to be nodding vigorously in

Meanwhile, over in the British ‘national’ TV debates, ITV’s first outing featured the Liberal Democrats, UKIP, the Green Party, Plaid Cymru and the Scottish National Party while the Tories and Labour refused to show even though they were invited. As I write, the BBC is hoping to have all seven.

But where are the invitations for those very loyal leaders of the DUP and the UUP, unionist voters might wonder.

They’re obviously not as British as Finchley.

June / Meitheamh 2017

www.anphoblacht.com

31

FILM REVIEW

Pointless Journey

BY CATHY POWER IT’S SAD to see what a truly pointless exercise this film eventually is when it had so much potential with two seasoned and talented actors playing two huge political characters in Ian Paisley and Martin McGuinness.

Colm Meaney does the best he can with the script as ‘Our Martin’ and Timothy Spall as Ian Paisley chimes with his public persona to those of us who didn’t know him as we did Martin.

The storyline, however, falls down on so many levels.

The title comes from a fictional car journey by the DUP and Sinn Féin leaders from St Andrews in Scotland to Edinburgh Airport. Crime novelist and screenwriter Colin Bateman (Murphy’s Law and Scúp) makes the obvious point that the growth of the relationship between the two men took a lot longer than 90 minutes but he argues he was writing for a foreign audience who would have little knowledge of Ireland, the recent conflict, or the two men.

The talks, at St Andrews in 2006, between the Irish and British governments, all the parties in the North – including Sinn Féin and the DUP – resulted in the St Andrews Agreement, the formation of a new Executive,

restoration of the Assembly and (ultimately) Sinn Féin supporting a new beginning to policing. It was a bit more complicated than Paisley shaking hands with Martin McGuinness after a jaunt in the Scottish countryside.

The plot is that Paisley, mid-talks, wants to go home for the night to celebrate his 50th wedding anniversary.

When the Sinn Féin delegation is told of this, Martin decides to go with him.

This much is true, but while the two men were on the same flight home,

The title comes from a fictional car journey by the DUP and Sinn Féin leaders from St Andrews in Scotland to Edinburgh Airport they were not alone and they travelled to the airport in separate cars.

The film suggests that the stalled talks would be saved if the relationship between the two men softened during the journey. So British Intelligence bug the car and we are asked to believe that Tony Blair, Bertie Ahern, sundry British civil servants and Gerry Adams (!) all stand around a monitor together watching and listening to them as the journey progresses. It stretches fiction to ludicrous.

As the movie journey nears its end, the watching Brits agree that they need more time, so the Special Branch driver, who begins the journey by feigning

5 Timothy Spall and Colm Meaney star as Ian Paisley and Martin McGuinness

ignorance of who he has in his car (really?), is told to divert from the main road and lose the security detail.

There follows a cringe-fest where they walk in the woods, come upon a dying deer which Martin goes to put out of its misery before deciding not to, explore a derelict church (which conveniently provides a pulpit for Free Presbyterian preacher Dr Paisley) and wander in a graveyard while expressing the most trite beliefs about Ireland, their politics and the conflict.

The final moments, when the handshake takes place, has each man saying they despise everything for

Director: Nick Hamm Producers: Mark Huffam, Nick Hamm, Piers Tempest Written: Colin Bateman Starring: Timothy Spall, Colm Meaney, Freddie Highmore, John Hurt Running time: 1 hour 34 minutes

5 Sinn Féin in the real drama of the St Andrews Agreement and (right) Ian Paisley and Martin McGuinness

which the other stands. The unspoken suggestion is that, despite that, they will work together.

I saw the film in the Irish Film Institute with a Q&A with the screenwriter, Colin Bateman. He had met Martin in the Bogside during the creation of the script and confided to the IFI audience that he was aware he was entering “enemy territory” and had to think about if he would shake hands with Martin when introduced. He did.

If this was the starting point of the script, it could have been worse but since very little of the storyline bears any relationship to the truth (except

that the men concerned did, indeed, form a friendship and were able to work together at a very significant moment

The St Andrews Agreement was a bit more complicated than Paisley shaking hands with Martin McGuinness after a jaunt in the Scottish countryside in history), there is – regrettably – really no point to it at all.

Wait until it appears on Netflix or turns up on television to see what you think.

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Sraith Nua Iml 40 Uimhir 6 – June / Meitheamh 2017

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5 Aid agency Trocaire’s message at the gates of Leinster House as part of the 'Global Week of Action on Divestment' for the Irish Government to divest from fossil fuels

5 The Dublin May Day march from Parnell Square to Liberty Hall, organised by the Dublin Council of Trade Unions, highlighted the housing and homeless crisis

5 An Lá Dearg 20ú Bealtaine 2017

5 World-famous artist Robert Ballagh presents a portrait of Martin McGuinness to Martin's children at a Belfast celebration of the late Sinn Féin leader's life

5 The flag of Palestine flies over Dublin City Hall for one month after councillors voted for the gesture of solidarity, a move emulated by local councils in other parts of Ireland