Speech by An Rúnaí Ginearálta to the Ard-Fheis

12/05/08

A chairde,

Go raibh maith agaibh as teacht anseo inniu agus as an tacaíocht a thug sibh i rith na mbliana. Feicim thart an seomra go bhfuil poblachtánaigh ó gach chearn den tír. Tá aithne agam ar chuid agaibh agus níl ar chuid eile. Ta fáilte romhaibh uilig.

Thank you to every one for coming today and for the support you have shown éirígí over the last two years. This room itself is a credit to such a young party and I see here today republicans from all over the country, young and old, some I know and some I don’t.

You are all equally welcome.

There are a lot of things I could not have predicted in life and in politics. I couldn't have known when I became politically aware in my late teens, like the rest of you, that the political journey my life would take me on would be so broad, would be full of joy and pain, success and failure, and endurance.

And my life is average, if not insignificant in terms of the history of republicanism.

I have been shaped and changed by the conditions of my time. My opinions and views have been moulded by different events in my life. I am a republican, political ex-prisoner, who is as devoted today to the realisation of Irish freedom, as I was when I first involved myself in republican politics.

I could not have predicted the road that would unfold before us. I’m sure not one of us could. In forty years of war and struggle we have all seen much. Every generation in this room has been inspired by some event, or series of events, to become involved in republican political activism.

However, some of our people have become tired; some no longer have the enthusiasm or the energy they once had and that is understandable. We have come through one of the most debilitating and dis-empowering phases that republican history has ever endured.

For me, the last ten years of republican activism have been worse by far, emotionally and physically, than the ten years I spent locked up. And I am sure that there are many who feel the same. éirígí has been a political ray of hope in that time.

Looking around this room, it is clear that there are comrades and friends from all over this island who are not here. The reasons for this are many and varied.

We have to find ways to change that and to once again unite all republicans under a common banner.

I have engaged in many strands of the republican struggle, from war to prison, community politics to party politics. I have tried to play my part in the struggle to the best of my ability. My advice for any republican seeking radical change in Ireland today would be to knock on éirígí’s door.

That’s why I am here.

We in éirígí know well the nature of political struggle in Ireland. We have stepped out and established what I believe to be a disciplined, dedicated and determined political organisation, which is willing and committed to achieving republican ideals.

Yet in this sense we are no different to the litany of other small groups of people who, throughout the ages of human history and republican history, have taken a leap of faith and established and spearheaded a new idea.

Our motivations for doing this are plentiful. First and foremost is our belief that the Irish nation deserves nothing less than its equal place in the world. We believe that a minority of people are preventing this from happening. These people are the wealthy and the powerful.

They wear many different hats and have many different faces yet they share a commonality that is simple and simply defined - They benefit from this system, and they will do anything they need to maintain it.

They will keep our kids in poverty, they will keep our young people in despair, they will inflict misery and mayhem when they need to and they will take a pound of flesh from every one of us to feed their already fat mouths.

The brutality of imperialism, and in our case British imperialism, is well documented.

It echoes in Ireland and through every continent in the world. However, so does the resistance to it. Such resistance is well documented in our history.

We know that every generation of Irish people has resisted British rule and all that it entails. We know that there have been seven armed insurrections since the formation of Irish republicanism. We also know that it is likely that there will continue to be that resistance until the Brits leave and we achieve the republic.

We know that every attempt by the British establishment to justify their forced occupation of our country, and the oppression and abuse of our people, has been resisted in every century and by every generation of Irish citizens. We know that bit-by-bit Irish women and men have pushed against the tyranny of capitalism and occupation.

We have had success and failure. But we have never, ever, given up on the ultimate objective – a free and sovereign nation that we can call our own. And I believe we never will.

That is the lesson that the British government, and the people who support or facilitate it, seem incapable of learning – That it doesn’t matter how many years, how many prisons, how many deaths or how many injustices that their rule inflicts on us. The Irish people will resist, and will overcome.

We must recognise that there is a lot of work in this. Particularly now in this current difficult phase, where the heads can be down and a sense of despair can creep in.

We need to work twice as hard in times like these to keep the idea fresh and to inspire more and new people to carry it. We need to build in every town and in every club and in every community hall. Everywhere people organise and congregate.

We need to bring the radical idea of an Irish socialist republic to as many of our fellow citizens as possible and we need to expose and oppose every manifestation of British rule, of west Brit rule, or of oppressive rule that we see. In order to do that, we need to organise and educate others and ourselves.

éirígí has steadily grown over the last two years. We have taken up the right campaigns and been diligent and well disciplined in our approach to them. We have networked with the right people and analysed the political landscape thoroughly. We have stayed away from petty and naive squabbles and such diversions. We have to maintain all of that and build upon it.

We understand well the harsh environment in which we work. Where the ‘end of history’ analysis permeates almost everything, where the great and the good would have us believe that there is no alternative to the status quo in Ireland. We live in an environment where the entire apparatus of two right-wing states and a British government will bear down upon us in every way it has to. We know this all well, however, day and daily groups and individuals across Ireland defy the powers that be – they resist in their own ways.

In housing committees and residents associations, in cooperatives and in political groups, in workplaces, and in unions – on the ground it is clear that people can claim back power!

It is the Irish people who actually run this country; the thieves in the government buildings in Dublin, London and Belfast merely live off our backs.

We already have the power – we just do not use it.

Perhaps we do not use it for fear of what might happen, for fear of reprisals by a Brit police force, or a Free State police force, or MI5 or any of the other punitive bodies they have to keep us in fear.

Perhaps it is apathy, which prevents us from using it. However, we must individually and collectively reach the point where we no longer allow fear or apathy to prevent us from acting and claiming our place in our country. We need to reach the point where we are no longer asking for our rights but demanding them. Where we are not protesting the theft of our resources, but simply taking back, by whatever means necessary, what is rightfully ours.

Each and every one of us works and lives within this status quo. We know poverty, we know debt; we know mortgages, we know exclusion, we know all of it and all of the ills that this system throws at us.

We know the bankers too who will try to cripple us. We know the landlords who will steal from us. We know the peelers and Brits who will beat us and shoot at us. We know the enemy – And so does everyone else.

It is our job as political activists to encourage our fellow citizens to rise up and use their power as a member of this nation. And in the true sense of democracy, claim their rights as equal citizens. It is our job to encourage people to defy this minority who benefit from running our country and running our lives.

We need to begin the business of completely deconstructing and replacing what this status quo has built up. We need to replace it with people-centred alternatives, not with more houses on the hill, or brown envelopes or with more multinational investment conferences.

It is this battleground that éirígí must fight on. éirigí will continue to promote its politics in every forum available to it. We must guard against becoming hegemonic, or parochial or overbearing. We have seen this in the past and it has failed the struggle.

For the revolution to be a success we will have to genuinely encourage our people to rise up – To rise up and take power for themselves. This is a massive task, and like every task it begins with first steps.

Our first steps were taken over two hundred years ago when Irish women and men declared the root cause of Ireland’s ills to be foreign occupation and denial of our rights. These remain the root cause of our ills.

And, regardless of the assaults, the abuse or the slander we must challenge the problem at its source. We must not, and this is really important, we must not be distracted into battles with other republicans. We know well who the enemy of the Irish nation is and we must focus all our energies there.

We must challenge every vestige of the British Empire in Ireland. And support our comrades internationally to challenge similar enemies; we must do this now, today, tomorrow and for however long it takes.

I believe we have the ability to win and if we apply our minds and our energies we can reduce the time it will take to drive the Brits from Ireland. We have to do it: for our families, for our comrades, for our friends, for the future, and most importantly because it is the right thing to do.

There is nothing more powerful in this world than a risen people who understand the power they wield. There is nothing that the minority, in favour of this system, fear more.

So I’ll finish with the words of James Connolly who said: “We believe in constitutional action in normal times; we believe in revolutionary action in exceptional times. These are exceptional times.”

Ar aghaidh linn le chéile.

Go raibh maith agaibh.