Derry honours Kevin Lynch
Last Sunday, 29 July, a group of Sinn Féin activists from
Waterford travelled to Dungiven in County Derry to mark the 20th
anniversary of the death of hunger striker Kevin Lynch.
A special bond of solidarity was formed between Derry and
Waterford in 1981 when Lynch, an INLA prisoner and the eighth
hunger striker to join the H Block fast, was selected to stand in
the Leinster House election in June of that year.
Lynch polled 3,337 votes in an election that saw his fellow
hunger striker Kieran Doherty elected as TD for Cavan/Monaghan,
while their comrade Dundalk man Paddy Agnew was elected in Louth.
In all there were nine prisoner candidates in the 26-County
election, who polled a collective 42,798 votes, and in taking two
Fianna Fáil seats they affected the outcome of the election,
costing Fianna Fáil its overall majority.
In Waterford, where Lynch stood, his votes came mostly from the
labour movement. The anti-H Block campaign in that county was
built on the work of labour and trade union activists.
Speaking at the 20th anniversary rally held last Sunday in
Dungiven Cemetery and attended by around 1,000 people, the
recently elected Sinn Féin MP for Fermanagh and South Tyrone,
Michelle Gildernew, welcomed the Waterford Sinn Féin activists
and thanked them for travelling to be with Kevin's family.
Also at Sunday's rally was a group of people from Luton in
Bedfordshire in England, where Kevin worked for a while before
his arrest in December 1976.
Gildernew said that internationally the hunger strike had exposed
Britain's role in Ireland, showing that the British weren't here
as reluctant peacemakers but were central to creating and
perpetuating the conflict.
Her own recent victory in the Westminster election, when
republicans reclaimed the seat first won by Bobby Sands 20 years
ago, was the fruits of a long hard struggle that began in 1981.
``There can be no more fitting memory to those who gave their
lives on hunger strike than to work to achieve Irish unity and
independence, to create the democratic socialist republic for
which they died,'' said Gildernew.
Bernadette McAliskey also spoke at the rally, as did Gerry Ruddy
of the IRSP and Paul Little of the Irish Turkish Hunger Strike
Committee, who called for solidarity and support for the Turkish
hunger strikers.
After Sunday's event, the crowd gathered in the centre of the
town to witness the unveiling of a granite memorial to the hunger
strikers.
In the shape of an Easter Lily with a harp inset, the stone is
located at the Grove on Dungiven's Main Street, where crowds
gathered in 1981 in support of the Hunger Strikers and in
particular to show solidarity with Kevin's family and to say the
rosary.
The unveiling ceremony was carried out by Kevin's brothers and
sisters.