Democratic Palestine : 7 (ص 18)
غرض
- عنوان
- Democratic Palestine : 7 (ص 18)
- المحتوى
-
1980. They had five basic demands: (1) No prison uniform;
(2) No prison work; (3) Free association; (4) Full remission on
sentences; (5) Adequate visits, food parcels and recreational/
education facilities.
The British government promised to concede these
demands and the hunger strike ended after 53 days. When the
British reneged on their promises, a second hunger strike led
by Bobby Sands began on March 1, 1981. By August 20, 1981,
ten republicans had died on the hunger strike and no meaning-
ful concession had been offered by the British government. By
October of that year the combination of concessions and the
intervention by the families of the hunger strikers at the critical
part in their sons’ hunger strike brought an end to this protest.
The British conceded on all the demands except the major one
of free association.
But importantly the massive support demonstrated for the
hunger strikers destroyed the thrust of Britain's criminalisation
policy both nationally and internationally. That policy, which
was an integral part of Britain’s attempt to politically isolate the
Republican Movement from the Irish people, was buried by the
100,000 people who attended the funeral of Bobby Sands in
May 1981.
In the face of broad mass support for the hunger strikers,
the political response of the British government was one of
deceit. In attempt to pose as reasonable people but in reality to
Stall for time in order to sap the will of the hunger strikers and
undermine support for their cause, the British government
encouraged and facilitated interventions by the European
Commission for Human Rights, the International Committee of
the Red Cross, the Irish Commission for Justice and Peace,
and various political and religious individuals including a papal
envoy. In the course of these interventions the British alluded
to concessions without producing the substance. Militarily the
response was equally typical of imperialism in crisis-naked
force. The British army and the RUC killed at least eight civi-
lians during this period of heightened protest, including three
children under 15 and a young married mother. Hundreds of
others were injured, many seriously and permanently, while
nationalist people were subjected to a massive upsurge in
arrests, house searches and mini-curfews.
Concerning the relation to armed struggle: During the
hunger strike in 1980, the level of IRA activity was deliberately
restricted. This, they explained, was in order to prevent any
diversion of public attention from the issues of the hunger
strike.
However, fearing that the British would very consciously
Cause a protracted hunger strike in 1981, in order to maintain
a low level of armed revolutionary activity to accomodate their
scheme for normalisation, the IRA employed revolutionary
force throughout the second hunger strike.
By September '81 the British government had acknow-
ledged thirty-seven fatalities and over 150 casualties among
its forces over that nine month period as a result of IRA actions.
The largest proportion of these (29 deaths) were from the inde-
genous British forces of the RUC and UDR, reflecting their role
in the forefront of Britain’s «Ulsterisation» of the war. Millions of
pounds worth of damage, for which the British government is
liable, was caused in attacks on commercial property, while
there were also two attacks on British military establishments
in Britain itself.
British security was also penetrated at the Sullom Voe oil
terminal in the Shetland Islands where the IRA planted a bomb
18
on the day of an official visit by the English Queen.
The IRA seems to have had little need to explain its action
throughout this period. Against the background of young pat-
riots dying on hunger strike on almost a weekly basis, of chil-
dren being murdered on our streets by the British army and
intense general oppression, such an explanation would have
been superfluous. That is not to say, however, that the IRA has
not had to patiently explain its actions throughout the past fif-
teen years of armed struggle. But in circumstances which pre-
vailed during the hunger strike, the toleration of any people in
regard to the employment of revolutionary force is naturally
much higher.
How did Sinn Fein’s policy of contesting elections
develop?
Republican participation in the elections in 1981 was coin-
cidental rather than planned and in nature was more of an elec-
toral intervention than part of an electoral strategy. It was coin-
cidental in that in the occupied zone the opportunity arose out
of the death of the sitting independent nationalist MP for the
Westminister constituency of Fermanagh/South Tyrone at a
time when Bobby Sand’s hunger strike was already well
advanced, and in the Free State as a result of a snap general
election called by Charles Haughey, the then premier, at atime
when four hunger strikers had already died. Republicans
seized these occasions as further opportunities of publicising
the prisoners’ cause.
In the event, the Irish electorate, where given the oppor-
tunity rallied to the hunger strikers. In Fermanagh/South
Tyrone, Bobby Sands, then 41 days on hunger strike, gained
30,492 votes on April 10, 1981, and was elected as MP to the
Westminister parliament in what was then the clearest rebuttal
of the British government's attempt to criminalise the struggle
and politically isolate republicans from the people.
In the August by-election which resulted from Bobby's
death, Owen Carron, his election agent, was then elected to
the same seat on an increased majority of 31,273 votes. Car-
ron’s intervention was instanced by the on-going H-Block cam-
paign and the legislation passed by the British Parliament after
Sands’ death which prevented prisoners from becoming par-
liamentary candidates.
In the Free State general elections in June ‘81, the elec-
toral intervention of H-Block prisoner candidates caused the
ousting of the incumbent government and the election of two
H-Block prisoners to the Free State parliament, Leinster
House. Between them the prisoner candidates gained some
40,000 votes. All of those candidatures were on the basis of the
H-Block campaign and not as members of the Republic Move-
ment.
From those electoral interventions and in conjunction with
Our ongoing review of policy and analysis of the struggle, Sinn
Fein’s electoral strategy evolved. It is perhaps necessary at
this point to explain the Sinn Fein attitude to the various elected
assemblies in Britain and Ireland. Republicans refuse to recog-
nise the legitimacy of the London or Dublin government author-
ity. That refusal is based on the refusal by those governments
to accept the democratic wishes of the Irish people as expres-
sed in the last all-!reland election in 1918, when Sinn Fein won
78 out of 105 seats, and on the armed enforcement of the par-
tition of our own country by the British government in direct
contradiction of those wishes. The Sinn Fein constitution for-
bids any member to take his/her seat in any of the partitionist
assemblies in London, Dublin or Belfast. Sinn Fein candidates,
therefore, contest such elections on an abstentionist basis. - هو جزء من
- Democratic Palestine : 7
- تاريخ
- ديسمبر ١٩٨٤
- المنشئ
- الجبهة الشعبية لتحرير فلسطين
Contribute
Not viewed