Sinn Fein hopes the new addition (hardly Gareth Bale in terms of the transfer market) will help propel the party towards office, while Andrews anticipates the turn being reciprocated by way of a stab at a candidacy that would facilitate his passage back into Leinster House.
Those in the party who still believe it has any serious Left orientation might just wonder - in spite of the thought police prohibiting wonder of any sort other than wondrous thoughts about the wonderful leader – what it all means. Others, who have come to view Sinn Fein as Provisional Fianna Fail, will not wonder in the slightest.
A persistent feature of Sinn Fein has been its reliance on whisper weasels to initiate smear campaigns in order to discredit opponents or detractors. Mark McLernon from its Northern Press office was caught a matter of weeks ago smearing to the Sunday World people the party took umbrage to. When Sinn Fein allows another arrow into its quiver it does so having studied the type of target likely to be hit.
Andrews says he left Fianna Fail because:
It had become very clear to me that Fianna Fail no longer represented the ideals or values of the party’s founders, including my grandfather. In particular, I was unhappy at how distant Fianna Fáil had become from the communities and ordinary people it had originally sought to represent and who were and still are suffering the brunt of the economic problems in the country.
A more plausible explanation is that he jumped before he was shoved. He was a serial smear artist who ran a Twitter account @brianformerff ripping the back out of his colleagues in Fianna Fail.
According to The Independent:
The tweets Mr Andrews now admits sending were generally scathing of his party. They included: "@randomirishnews Labour have sold out and FF have proven to be incompetent and a large number of them dishonest at the top of the party."
Another tweet read: "@lawlessj FF will never recover while current leadership is there. People like S Donnelly are future."
Fianna Fail leader Micheal Martin also came under further attack from @brianformerff: "@oliverpgolden Martin was mentioned in #mahon so how can he still claim that he should be leader."
Another read: "FF should take Noel Whelan's advice and close up shop and get rid of hierarchy like willie O'Dea, martin, dorgan and start fresh."
Another read: "FF should take Noel Whelan's advice and close up shop and get rid of hierarchy like willie O'Dea, martin, dorgan and start fresh.
But it did not stop at ripping the back out of Fianna Fail: The Examiner reported that:
Tweets from @brianformerff, later identified as ex-TD Chris Andrews:
Friday, Mar 23, 3.12pm * @MaryLouMcDonald Hard to take SF/Adams lecturing Bertie on being corrupt after all they have done!! Keep out of it. #mahon
*Thursday, Mar 29, 11am *[twitter handle deleted] I agree with a lot of your views but given what SF has done to innocent people its a bit much listening to you pontificate.
*11.01am *[twitter handle deleted] Was it not corrupt to bury mother of 10 Jean Mc Conville. Is that acceptable to you. Selective outrage i thinks!!
*11.03am *[twitter handle deleted] What about the ink cartridges! Was that okay? Hard to take SF being moralistic!! Its not their thing!
*1.43pm* [twitter handle deleted] knows all about killing given the amount of people Sinn Féin Reps killed over the years. #jeanmcconville
*Wednesday, Apr 18, 12.39pm *[twitter handle deleted] Ordinary working class people who have guns stuck in their face by your friends. they are the ones terrorised.
Sinn Fein can easily defend itself against accusations that the latest development is without rhyme or reason in terms of putting together a front bench team if it makes it into coalition.
Our opponents are reduced to jeering
Because they are now left fearing
The Minister for Disappearing
&
The Minister for Anonymous Smearing.
What a joke that this man has joined Sinn Fein after saying all he did about them... Nothing surprises me anymore. We've seen the same type of thing at home where certain people who despised us and ran the party into the dirt only 15-20 years ago are now sitting at Comhairle Ceanntair meetings having mysteriously converted to republicanism. The reality is that it suits the party to appease them due to how it helps their profile in the community while it suits such individuals to further their own interests even should that mean jumping shop mid-race. One man in particular, Gerry McCusker from Omagh, was among the most vitriolic opponents of the Republican Movement and the community group he was behind constantly sought to liaise with the RUC and UDR, to bring them into the community as 'friendly faces'. I recall one event they organised for local children were the RUC supplied ropes for tug of war and the UDR supplied food for the children. At the same time they were demanding that we remove a mural put up for the 20th anniversary of the Hungerstrikes and constantly tried to have the national flag that flies top the flats of the Strule Park estate removed. A solid republican alright, but sure doesn't he fit in well. What I can't believe is how some of the men I was in a Cumann with at that time can just sit back and pretend this isn't happening, such is the fear of doing anything that might cost you a position I think those still in Sinn Fein will go along with practically anything - for to have the likes of McCusker sitting with a straight face at your meetings is the biggest joke of all. If you'll tolerate that you'll tolerate anything
ReplyDeleteLOL What a gombeen carpetbagger Andrews really is ,he will fit in nicely with his former ff friend Mary Lou,quisling $inn £eind on their onward march to power have long since abandoned any semblance of the party once led by Maura Drumm ,they have ditched everything even slightly revolutionary and have become a magnet for wannabes and egotists, mind you with a lying toerag of a president for life what else could you expect from such a parcel of rouges..
ReplyDeleteThe Basic Concept is.
ReplyDeleteTHIS MAN CAN NEVER BE TRUSTED.
he is like the little boy who goes into the shop with his mate to steal sweets , he is caught , and , screams , HE MADE ME DO IT. LOW LIFE! , But he is joining good company. Plenty off those in SF.
Sinn Fein so not surprise me at all anymore. This new addition to Sinn Fein mentions corruption / liars at the top of his original party and feels Sinn Fein is a better choice? Really? Has he missed the lies that spew from Gerry Adams? Gerry is a devious pied piper. I have been friends with a few SF members, just regular people at the bottom and they just spew the party line. My heart near stopped when watching Gerry Adams holding the photos of a hunger striker on the Andersonstown Road last year. The very same who could have survived. If only Gerry had not been a devious liar.
ReplyDeleteSean bres-
ReplyDeleteAt the same time I listen to people
complaining about Sinn Fein who were in nothing 20 or 30 years ago-
are you telling me that those in the Societies or other groups were military minded 30 years ago or today-because I can tell you they weren't-there is no such thing today as hardl1ners that the media tries to tell us daily-they just do not exist-
Mickey,
ReplyDeletewhat does militarism have to do with it like many others reading that standard is confusing unless you are stating that the militants within PSF hold sway over matters?
If PSF get a bit jittery as people awaken to their private members only agenda the only ones to blame are those in charge of the party.
What sort of future is in store when its foundations are concrete lies!
Micky Henry for a man who rabbits on about military this and that and about who killed how many Brits and cops you were a bit of a draft dodger yourself were you not?
ReplyDeleteThen again so was Marty and Gerry.
Here wheres that Michaelhenry?
ReplyDeleteHeres proof that the RUC are still part and parcel of the PSNI...
From the Inquest into first fatal PSNI operation:
[...] At a preliminary inquest hearing into the death on Tuesday, a lawyer for the family of Mr McConville told coroner Suzanne Anderson that both officers had been involved in contentious lethal force RUC operations during the Troubles.
Karen Quinlivan QC said the detective superintendent and inspector who had been in the command room during the incident, also had roles in operations that resulted in the death of 22-year-old IRA man Pearse Jordan, who was shot shortly after the stolen car he was driving was rammed by police in west Belfast in 1992.
She said the inspector had also been in the RUC undercover unit that shot dead a Catholic teenager Michael Tighe in an alleged 'shoot-to-kill' incident in 1982.
The court was also told by the lawyer that the officer had fired 30 shots into the hay shed at a suspected IRA arms dump where the 19-year-old was killed.
Ms Quinlivan claimed the officer had also been involved in at least one other shooting, and also during his career had evidence provided by him criticised in a separate crown court case [...]
http://www.u.tv/News/Inquest-into-first-fatal-PSNI-operation/dd85f132-b6aa-493b-9e33-06984dcb3534
Tain Bo's right it's got nothing to do with the military option. But the people in the Societies Michael, at least those in our part of the world (I can't speak for the likes of Belfast or Derry but I dare say neither can you) are for the most part people who've been there all the way through and have every right to complain. That anyone has since come in of a younger age-profile should be welcomed rather than castigated but even at that why should they not be allowed to complain about Sinn Fein given that it purports to be the public manifestation of Irish republicanism? I think I know the point you're trying to make and to be fair I don't know the situation in other parts of the country but you don't need me to tell you it doesn't apply to the people round Tyrone involved with the 1916 Societies. A good friend of mine was buried by the movement a few years back and was given a republican burial having been claimed by the army. I was asked to do black and white at the funeral procession but I refused. Some of those involved in doing so were quite simply put not republicans and were never republicans, the amount of people who went mad about it afterwards you would not believe - that such-and-such could have the face to stand to attention at an IRA funeral and that Sinn Fein had the front to include him. The particular man in question is a decent enough guy but when the movement needed his support he was canvassing for Johnny McLaughlin and the SDLP. Because despite running round now as the big Shinner he's not and never was a republican. That's the point I make. As for McCusker who I mentioned earlier the man was a genuine opponent of ours with a genuine hatred in his heart for the republican movement and the republican struggle - I'd go as far as to call his like 'pro-Brit'. Now he sits at Comhairle Ceanntair meetings unfazed by his past as though it's the most natural thing in the world? These aren't isolated examples and this is only Omagh town we're talking about. I've time enough for the likes of yourself Mickey but for that waste of space I've none whatsoever, likewise those cronies of his who also have somewhere along the line mysteriously become Irish republicans. Chris Andrews eat your heart out, he's far from out of place
ReplyDeleteSean its a common story throughout the country, those who once stood up and condemned the republican movement now are only to glad to sup at the same troth,I include here the catholic church and the gaa, those who have crawled out of the woodwork and strut around like a latter day Dan Breen,have been well sussed by the kids in these areas who call these clowns ceasefire heroes.its no bad thing that they are all lumped together as anyone who sweeps a floor can tell you,you gather all the rubbish in one place before you dump it .
ReplyDeleteI've tried really hard to understand the how-many-Brits-have-the-dissos-killed argument, but I just cannot understand why the killing proficiency of a paramilitary group today or the participation in armed activities thirty years ago makes any difference to the analysis/criticism of Sinn Féin as a political party.
ReplyDeleteI remember Anthony's observation a few years back that the term "dissident" is used by Sinn Féin to stifle criticism of its leaders. The upshot is that in the public mind, anyone who believes that administering British law via Stormont is an affront to republican prinicples is automatically assumed to support armed struggle.
Maybe the best course of action is, as Anthony advised, to embrace the dissident label and make it our own. In my own life, I have come to question and eventually reject much of the beliefs and values I was taught to accept without question. Perhaps we should turn Roy Foster's dictum on its head and admit that "we are all dissidents now." Well, all except for Michael Henry, but I reckon he's a closet dissident deep down!
Alfie,
ReplyDeletethat made me laugh our very own Mickey being a closet dissident. He has been using that same line for years but I don’t think he has offered an explanation. Not that it matters as an explanation would be as senseless as the line.
The only thing anti treaty republicans share is just that anti treaty with no unified political front. What is lacking is a strong political (one) voice that could give SF a run for their money. Without unity there is little to no chance of running an objective political campaign.
When elections are held anti treaty republicans are snookered and many would vote SF as they have no other choice.
Without a central unified political party the various factions will just splinter and in time become irrelevant dots on the political map.
We can accept whatever term is leveled at anti treaty republicans but without a unified political party we should accept the war is over SF shot the provos in the foot and they were carried off on an English stretcher all happily convalescing singing goodbye to Tiperrary and hello Leicester square.
Not to upset Mickey’s mathematical formula but anti treaty republicans should push for a political party one that can effectively represent their views and give a voice to the voiceless.