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  Martha Mallon Ar Slí An Fhirinne.  It’s the age we’re at I tell myself and my declining peer group as we attend funeral after funeral this last wee while.  The great wheel of life is now turning for our generation. This phase started with Colette’s sister Martha. Martha was eighty five. The matriarch of the Ma llon family. A kind, strong, gentle woman who lived on through Parkinson’s and the loss of her husband Jim and their son Jim. Martha was ferried between Andytown and Donegal and Spain by her devoted family until her time came. Mary Herald, the same age as Martha and a childhood friend and neighbour in the Whiterock went next. A valiant Camóg in her day and a lifelong Antrim Gael. Then out of the blue our friend and comrade Damien Gibney died quietly and unexpectedly dozing in his chair. Damien, one of the two first Sinn Féin Councillors elected to Lisburn, along with Pat Rice, in dangerous times will be deeply missed by May and Sineád and the entire Gibney cla...

  The People’s Archive by The People’s Priest Fr. Des Wilson died in November 2019. I first met him in 1968. His long life was dedicated to helping people.  During the years of conflict, he stood with the Upper Springfield community against the aggression and violence of the British state forces.  He gave comfort and solidarity to those in need and was hugely respected and loved. Fr. Des was the people’s priest, a community activist, an educator, a defender of people’s rights, an author, dramatist and writer. He was also a man of great courage, a good neighbour, and a decent human being. On a more personal note in 1971, after internment, Fr. Des married Colette and me while I was on the run. Last week the St. Comgall’s/Ionad Eileen Howell hosted an event celebrating Fr. Des’s life. On show were some of the 10,000 individual artefacts and documents that Fr. Des accumulated over his lifetime. Ciaran Cahill of Springhill Community House explained that the Lotter...

  Candidatitis I first published this article in 2007 and then, slightly amended in 2016. And again last year. We are only a wee while away from the local government elections in the North. Sinn Féin is standing its largest number of candidates ever in this contest including the most first candidates. So I thought this would be a good time to republish it again, slightly amended once more.  It is my tribute to the majority of candidates who won’t get elected. Think of them as you digest all the outcomes.  Good luck to them all. Good luck especially to Sinn Féin’s candidates. I hope we have a great result.  That’s all in the gift of the electorate. So I thank all the voters as well as all the candidates.  Opinion polls have become an integral part of every election campaign. Every newspaper and every broadcast outlet tries to second guess the electorate by commissioning polls. And then their columnists or pundits spend a huge amount of...

Republican Women negotiators.  The considerable media coverage of the 25 anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement frequently told the story of that negotiation through the words and voices of the leadership figures who participated. When the role of women in the talk’s process was mentioned it was almost exclusively in the context of the participation of the Women’s Coalition. While the Women’s Coalition undoubtedly played its part the absence of any focus on the part played by the many women from the other parties did a disservice to their involvement. During my contribution on the first day in the panel ‘Building Peace – the Parties’ that was chaired by Ambassador Nancy Soderberg I took the opportunity to read out a list of those women comrades who were consistently part of Sinn Féin’s negotiating team.  They included Síle Darragh, Siobhán O’Hanlon, Sue Ramsay, Dawn Doyle, Geraldine Crawford, Bríd Curran, Lucilita Bhreatnach, Bairbre de Brún, Dodie McGuinness, Chrissie...