David Higgins

Frank Flannery must be feeling like a complete idiot right now.

This photo taken during the week shows Kerry North TD, Martin Ferris collecting the two men convicted for the murder of Garda Jerry McCabe as they were released from Castlerea prison.

The Sinn Féin TD, once believed to be a member of the IRA Army Council has been condemned for his actions and I strongly condemn it as well.

Jerry McCabe was an innocent Guard who didn’t even have time to draw his own gun as he was struck down by 14 bullets in 1996. He was protecting an An Post van with another detective on June 6th when a jeep rammed their car forcing them to stop. The men from the van then riddled him an his parter with bullets killing him instantly and seriously injuring his partner.

Sinn Féin has consistently campaigned for the release of these thugs under the Good Friday Agreement and this week Pearse  McCauley and Kevin Walsh walked free into the arms of Martin Ferris.

It’s clear form this that Sinn Féin are still a party of violence and a party of the IRA. This collusion is surely the nail in the coffin of the short lived FG/SF co-alition rumour. Not under any circumstances will Fine Gael do business with Sinn Féin in national government and if such a deal comes to pass after the next general election I will have no problem in canceling my membership with the party.

I would love to know the attitude that the Guards have towards Martin Ferris in Kerry. Garda McCabe was from the county and if I were a Guard I would have no problem in ignoring the TD should he even come in need of the Guards.

I call on the people of North Kerry to burn down his house and see how the Guards react. Let the man realise that he needs the Guards and that his support of killers is not acceptable.

I am a lifelong hater of Fianna Fáil and its policies however I now have a new most hated party, Sinn Féin.

Today a second Sinn Féin councillor resigned for the party. This time it was Louise Minihan who was elected as a Sinn Féin candidate for Ballyfermot/Drimnagh ward on Dublin City Council. This follows Christy Burke who left shortly after the local elections citing a lack of support from the party as his reasons. This was huge as Burke was until then Sinn Féin’s longest serving councillor. Louise Minihan has blamed the party of lacking commitment to its socialist and republican values.

Defections are not unusual but they are uncommon. During the celtic tiger hardly anyone left their parties and even now it’s only confined to the likes of Joe Beehan, leaving Fianna Fáil over the education cuts. This was understandable as the cuts were unfair and that is just one of many reasons to leave Fianna Fáil. We are bound to see more defections from Fianna Fáil even though many describe it as a cult or religious like party with devotion higher above any other party.

Defections are a sign of weakness in a party and it appears that there’s an underlying problem in Sinn Féin. Many councillors in the South-East also complained about a lack of support from the party leaders and it surprises me that such a small party in the South of Ireland couldn’t have it’s Leader or even it’s Deputy leader visit all the candidates. This also highlights a possible structural deficiency in the country’s oldest party. Fine Gael was hit hard in ’02 because of bad party structures and bad campaigning (oh and Michael Noonan!). However they learned from their mistakes and built themselves up to become the largest party in local government.

Then there’s the ideological deficit. Cllr. Minihan was quite accurate when she talked about Sinn Féin being socialist and following republicanism. They are the two cornerstones of Sinn Féin ideology, yet they are the two things than she highlights as having been lost.

Personally I don’t see it. Remember that Sinn Féin are the only party in Ireland where you can buy an IRA t-shirt from their online store. While I disagree totally with this it’s hardly a deficiency in their core values.

Then there’s socialism. I have a lot of respect for Sinn Féin’s four TD’s as they come across as hard working honest people who care deeply for the well being of the lowest in society. However again I disagree with their policies and I don’t think I’ve heard a single measure they’d enact to address the recession. But again it’s clear from their 4 TD’s that they’re socialists. On the left wing scale Sinn Féin lies somewhere between Joe Higgins and Eamonn Gilmore. And remember anywhere near Joe Higgins has to be socialism. (I’m near him by surname but I guess I’m exempt from the rule.)

So while I don’t think Sinn Féin have dropped any of their core values it’s true that their support is down. They failed to capitalise on government protest votes as effectively as FG/Lab have. They left this years elections with almost the same number of councillors and they lost their MEP for Dublin.

I’d be doubtful as to whether a general election could go any better. Mary Lou McDonald is a certain to run in Dublin and it’s likely she’ll get elected. This would bring Sinn Féin to 5 seats however this would only be a small gain compared to the gains likely by FG/Lab and it’s also likely that this support could eat into SF’s 4 sitting TD’s.

Either way Sinn Féin is facing trouble. Once seen as a party of government within a decade it’s looking likely that they’ll continue to struggle in the South for some time.