Remembering the hunger-strikers
The Annual Bobby Sands Memorial Lecture was delivered by Eoghan
MacCormaic, who was in the H-Blocks during the blanket protest
and the hunger strikes. As republicans once again face difficult
decisions, Mac Cormaic said ``people are feeling the same
frustration, the same anguish, the same questioning now as they
did at the end of the hunger strikes.''
``The conflict in the H-Blocks came to a head with first hunger
strike in October 1980. It lasted 53 days, ending on December
18th 1980 with a 30 page document, said to contain a resolution
to the protests. Whether it contained the seeds of a resolution
or not, it wasn't in the detail. What was lacking, was the
political will. By January 1981, that became obvious. Republicans
needed to move the process on. Working with the best strategy and
intelligence we had, we decided to do things that wouldn't have
been countenanced a month earlier. To wash, to go through the
motions of being part of the sytem. The buzzword - flexibility.
``At the end of the second hunger-strike we were deluged with
propaganda and documents. And I put my hand up, I also pored over
the documents, line by line. We were dazzled by the fine print.
Trying to work out how we could put political status into the
document. But that was the wrong thing to do. You can't fit what
you want into the words that someone else has given you. We
focused on what we wanted. We wanted POW's out. We wanted
political status. We had to swallow a couple of pills that
weren't exactly the sweetest in the short-term. We went into the
mixed wings and won segregation, we went into the workshops and
brought the system to a standstill. Most of all we kept our eye
on the ball and although it took time to achieved our objectives,
achieve them we did. In the aftermath of the hunger strike
nothing was accepted as final.
``Everything offered was tested against our own agenda. We took
advantage of the rules, subverting them, turning them in on the
system. We challenged the denial of rights and we took advantage
of every opportunity. We educated, we agitated and we prepared.
People are worried about the Good Friday document, and ask if
it's enough. Of course it isn't, it isn't a republican document.
It does not offer a solution. People ask how we can square it
with our republican principles. We can't. But like the document
on offer during the prison protests, we shouldn't try to square
our principles with this document. We should look at the document
as something that moves the process on and take advantage of
that. We must keep our eye on the goal, not the detail of the
document.''
``I am proud to be a subversive, we are all subversives. It is our
duty. We are the agents of change and we want an end to British
rule in our country. We will come to the document on that basis,''
said Sinn Fein President, Gerry Adams in remembering Bobby Sands
and the 10 hunger strikers who died in 1981, the women of Armagh
and the 50 people who died on the streets that summer. He was
addressing thousands of people in Dunville Park on 3 May.
Of the Good Friday document, the Sinn Fein President said there
was nothing to fear, and that while republicanism was undefeated
unionism was divided. He said, ``Trimble will now have to business
with us, not on his terms but on our terms. We will meet him on
the basis of equality. We are prepared to reach out the hand of
friendship to help manage change.''
Bik McFarlane, O/C of the Blocks during the second hunger-strike,
told the crowd, ``the deaths of those men was the cornerstone for
wider political development.'' Quoting Bobby Sands, he said, ``If
they are not able to break the will of the Irish people, the
desire for freedom. They will not win.''
Six-County Saoirse Chairperson, Martin Meehan said: ``Like a wave
coming in, we cannot be stopped.'' He called on everyone to play
their part in the mass mobilisations across the Six Counties in
the coming months.
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