A chara, – I refer to the article by Noel Whelan (Opinion, October 9th). I also refer to the Marian Finucane Show on RTÉ Radio the previous weekend.
Eamon Gilmore was a student in UCG from 1972–76. At the end of the summer term of 1975 he was approached (by me and one other) and asked to join the UCG Republican Club, which he did. He was therefore a member of the UCG Republican Club/Official Sinn Féin for merely one year of his UCG career. He was not elected to any position within the club during that year.
Mr Whelan raises the issue of Mr Gilmore’s membership of the Resources Protection Campaign (RPC) while in UCG. Mr Gilmore’s membership of the RPC predated his membership of the UCG Republican Club. It coincides more closely with his membership of a student society called the Movement for Social Progress, which was loosely modelled on Students for Democratic Action.
As Mr Whelan points out, the name Sinn Féin – The Workers Party was only adopted in 1977, almost two years after Mr Gilmore joined. During that period there was an extensive consultation process and many quite lively debates. As Mr Gilmore was party to this entire process it seems extraordinary that he forgets the name of the organisation he joined, even if he were to forget the exact date of the name change.
In the radio interview on which Mr Whelan’s article comments, Mr Gilmore also stated that the person who most influenced him in the mid- to late-1970s was Proinsias De Rossa. I find this almost impossible to believe. In that period Mr De Rossa had no leadership role whatever in our party; was not a member of the ard comhairle, and was not involved in internal education. Is Mr Gilmore embarrassed to mention the names Tomás Mac Giolla or Cathal Goulding, who were most prominently associated with our party in the South? Or Cllr Malachy McGurran who was chairperson and chief spokesperson for our party in Northern Ireland? All three visited and spoke in Galway while Mr Gilmore was a student in UCG.
I have no idea why Mr Gilmore is so reticent about his past, most of which is, in any event, on public record. Maybe he remembers having canvassed for the Labour Party and Michael D Higgins in 1973, and walking away when they infamously joined Fine Gael in coalition? Now he is about to completely reverse his track and lead the Labour Party into the exact same coalition arrangement. Undoubtedly that is a U-turn that needs to be fudged. – Is mise,
PADRAIG MANNION,
UCG Republican Club 1974-79
Research Officer,
The Workers Party,
North Great George’s Street,
Dublin 1.