Who would have thought the day would come when SF would gather and call for more gardaí on the streets?, asks MIRIAM LORD
AND FIRST, the fallout from that Leaders’ Debate.
We looked out our window at midnight to find Micheál Martin barely clinging to the lamppost outside – completely buckled – and Eamon Gilmore lying face down in next door’s garden.
Enda Kenny was trying to hold Micheál up, but as the Fine Gael leader was half cut and listing alarmingly, he wasn’t making a very good job of it.
By early morning, the pair of them had slithered to the ground.
This is the stress of politics.
But the poster boys were back in action soon enough: Micheál and Enda out West and Eamon only an hour from Dublin in Navan.
Marvellous stamina on display under such dreadful pressure.
The voters of Sligo, Mayo and Meath are to be commended.
Back in Dublin, Sinn Féin launched its proposals for “community safety and tackling crime”.
The Irish Timeswas hoping Gerry Adams might be there. He's a Lord. This reporter is a Lord. Sure we're practically family now. Alas, he wasn't.
But Gerry is in town today, though, for the launch of the Sinn Féin manifesto. It’s happening this morning in Cassidy’s Hotel. Fianna Fáil Senator Donie is neutral when it comes to renting rooms for party political purposes in his fine establishment.
Sinn Féin’s combating crime launch was held at an interesting venue – the Department of Justice.
A British journalist tootled along to St Stephen’s Green for the event, through the door (revolving, of course) and up to the reception desk.
“I’m looking for the Sinn Féin policy launch. I understand it’s in here,” said the visiting correspondent, not unreasonably.
“Oh, no it’s not,” replied the man from the Department of Justice, with a thin smile. “I think they may be outside.”
Sure enough, there was Aengus Ó Snodaigh and fellow Sinn Féin candidates moving into position on the bottom two steps of the Department of Justice, over to one side so they wouldn’t block the entrance.
Cllr Dessie Ellis, who served a lengthy prison sentence in the 1980s for possession of explosives, was initially down to attend, but was delisted in a subsequent notification.
A solitary garda stood on duty, a few steps above them, near the door. She paid little heed to the Shinners. Times have changed since those occasions when SF only came to the Department of Justice to have a protest. You could hardly move, for all the policemen.
Back then, who would have thought the day would come when they would gather there and call for more gardaí on the streets – the same gardaí who spent years chasing their republican forebears/associates around the same streets?
In order to combat the problem of crime and antisocial behaviour affecting many communities, the party’s justice spokesman Ó Snodaigh proposed an increase in the number of gardaí and community gardaí on the ground “while also focusing on building better relationships between the community and the Garda”.
We wondered whether his words outside the Department of Justice yesterday were in keeping with his actions last November outside Government Buildings, when he was among a group of Sinn Féin protesters who forced their way through the gates, causing gardaí to draw their batons.
They can be clearly seen in television footage, pushing the automatic gates open.
His photograph was on a lot of front pages, in the thick of things.
“I’ve a right to protest but, if you look at the footage, I was trying, in fact, to help the gardaí,” explained the outgoing deputy for Dublin South Central. “If the garda had’ve calmed himself down we would not have had those pictures.”
But was Ó Snodaigh not in the vanguard of the people who pushed through the gates?
“They were open.”
He added he was trying to make sure people didn’t go through and this was borne out by video footage.
Helen McCormack, who is running for Sinn Féin in Dublin North East, said the gardaí had used “unnecessary due force” in restraining what was “a peaceful protest” when “20 or so people walked through”.
There was no law against them doing this.
Also present was veteran republican Larry O’Toole, who is a candidate in Dublin North East. The hardworking Larry is a popular figure around the constituency and this will be his fifth attempt to win a seat in Dáil Éireann.
“I think we’ll make the breakthrough this time,” he tells us. He might well be right, this time.
You’d miss Christy Burke, though. Sinn Féin stalwart Christy, a solid vote-getter in Dublin Central, left the mother ship in 2009 and is now running as an Independent. Mary Lou McDonald has taken his place.
Burke, meanwhile, missed out on the first week of the election campaign because he booked a holiday before the date was set.
A Sinn Féin activist at yesterday’s launch let slip some detail.
“Christy missed the first week of the election because he was off on a cruise. Only got back yesterday. He’s the colour of mahogany, so he is.”
What’s the betting it won’t be the last time that little bit of gossip is let slip on the doors in certain areas of Dublin Central?