Top Issue 1-2024

1 December 2020 Edition

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An important and historic role in the struggle

Although I had come across the odd copy here and there since at least 1979, the first issue of An Phoblacht that I actually bought was during the Hunger Strikes in the summer of 1981.

I was on my holidays in Ballinamore, Co. Leitrim and I bought the paper from Anna Gallogly, a republican who worked for the late John Joe McGirl, the well known and lifelong republican activist and Sinn Féin Vice President at the time.

This was shortly after the celebrated breakout by republican prisoners from Belfast’s Crumlin Road jail. Adorning the front page was a photograph of Dingus Magee who was now ‘on the run’ and giving a defiant, clenched fist salute to a cheering crowd from the platform at Bodenstown during the Wolfe Tone Commemoration.

At that time, John Joe and Anna were probably the only real, live republicans I had actually met. But, back home in Dublin, I didn’t know any republicans. My only contact with republican politics was An Phoblacht, which I read avidly. I often brought copies of the paper into school to pass around among my classmates.

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The late John Joe McGirl

One particular edition had a major impact on my teenage self. It was during the summer of 1983 and the edition covered the Wolfe Tone commemoration at Bodenstown, including the oration by Gerry Adams. I was hugely inspired by Gerry’s words and it was there and then that I made the decision to join Sinn Féin.

After a few years of peripheral and intermittent involvement, I eventually joined the Martin McKenna Cumann on the northside of Dublin. A fellow cumann member was Micheál Mac Donncha who worked as a journalist at An Phoblacht. Mícheál soon became my conduit to getting articles published in the paper.

Around 1988, I became a full-time An Phoblacht staff member under editor Rita O’Hare. The paper had recently moved from offices in the Kevin Barry Memorial Hall on Dublin’s Parnell Square to new premises a few doors away at Number 58.

An Phoblacht then was an exciting place to work - a hive of activity staffed by a collection of enthusiastic, energetic, and mainly young republicans. I felt very much at home.

Although diminutive in stature, one figure loomed very large in An Phoblacht in those days - the brilliant Rita O’Hare. Rita was a focussed, disciplined republican activist and committed to An Phoblacht’s role in the struggle. She engendered loyalty and a strong work ethic in her young charges among the editorial and layout staff. Full of straightforward common sense, she also didn’t suffer fools gladly and had a fearsome reputation! I very much looked up to Rita and still do.

A year or two after I joined the paper, Rita moved on to the role of Sinn Féin Director of Publicity and Mícheál Mac Donnacha was appointed editor. Mícheál was a very capable editor and steered the paper through the early years of the Peace Process with great skill. As editor, he was very good at giving feedback and direction and he was and is an excellent writer.

Producing a weekly newspaper like An Phoblacht in the 1980s and early 1990s was a much more labour intensive exercise than a similar operation would be today. It required considerable skills from the paper’s layout and design people such as Danny Devenny, Mark Dawson, and Liam Murphy. Light boxes, glue, scalpels, and typesetting machines were the order of the day.

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This very physical process lent a busy, industrious atmosphere to the office, especially on Wednesday evenings when the paper went to print. The vitality and excitement of the place was enhanced by the free-spirited youth of the staff who were great fun to work with in those heady days.

Initially writing reviews of various types, I also served my time as a proof-reader, working alongside more experienced proofers such as Robin Dunwoody and Margaret Robertson - colourful, interesting, and intelligent characters whose company I was privileged to share.

I soon moved on to writing news and features with my pieces typeset by Tina Smith. I was in An Phoblacht when computers arrived, and, in this regard, we were ahead of many of the much greater resourced mainstream newspapers.

Everyone at An Phoblacht had the greatest respect and admiration for the paper’s delivery drivers in the North. They risked their lives every week to ensure the paper got to our readers despite constant harassment from British forces and targeting by unionist paramilitaries.

I made lifelong friendships in those early years at An Phoblacht - too many to list here.

When I later moved on to work in various other capacities for the Movement, my relationship with the paper continued and I contributed articles whenever I could.

I had the honour and privilege of being appointed as the paper’s editor in 2005, the centenary year of Sinn Féin’s foundation, and served in that position for five years.

My time as editor was an eventful period for Irish republicanism. It covered seismic events, including Sinn Féin’s historic agreement with the DUP which restored the North’s Executive, serious violence caused by forcing Orange marches through nationalist areas in north Belfast, and the financial meltdown in the South and fateful state bailout of Irish banks.

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But it is the edition of 28 July, 2005 which, for me, stands out most from my time as editor. That week, we covered the IRA’s decision to end its armed campaign. It seemed an awesome responsibility to me to deal with this truly historic moment in our country and our Movement’s history. 

How to pay worthy tribute to the huge courage and sacrifice of the IRA’s Volunteers over three decades in a newspaper with finite space? But we did our very best and I was relieved and gratified by the response from key republican figures who served at the forefront of our struggle over all those years.

All of us who have worked on the paper share a deep affinity with An Phoblacht and its important and historic role in the struggle.

When I bought that first copy back in 1981, it was the only way of getting a republican view of what was going on in the country. Today, people of the same age go online for political news and analysis. And, in a vastly changed media environment, An Phoblacht, as always, has adapted and moved with the times with an expanded online presence and an attractive hard copy magazine format.

An Phoblacht is still very much playing its role within Irish republicanism and long may it continue. An Phoblacht Abú!

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An Phoblacht
44 Parnell Sq.
Dublin 1
Ireland