General election must mark sea-change in Irish politics – Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin TD

Cavan/Monaghan Dáil candidates Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin and Kathryn Reilly

THE general election must mark a sea change in Irish politics, Sinn Féin’s Dáil leader  has said. The priority of the new Dáil must be to reverse the cuts and challenge the IMF sell-out, he said.

Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin TD said there will be widespread relief and satisfaction that the end of this Fianna Fáil/ Green Government is now clearly in sight.

The extraordinary events unfolding in Fianna Fáil have seen an embattled Taoiseach make a huge miscalculation, the Cavan/Monaghan TD said, thinking he could pull the cynical political stroke of appointing new Cabinet ministers to try and salvage some political advantage for Fianna Fáil a few weeks before a general election.

That miscalculation was based on the fact that up to now the Green Party has acted as the mudguard for Fianna Fáil, even accepting the sell-out of economic sovereignty in the IMF/EU deal.

Both Fianna Fáil and the Greens deserve to be devastated at the polls on March 11th.

The Sinn Féin TD , who has led resistance in the Dáil by Sinn Féin TDs against Government cuts and the IMF sell-out, said:

Sinn Féin looks forward to the general election campaign and to presenting our vision for Ireland’s future and our proposals for economic recovery to the people across the length and breadth of this state.

Sinn Féin welcomed the setting of the general election date but it could and should still be held earlier – on February 11^th if the Dáil were to be dissolved today, January 21st, the 92nd anniversary of the inaugural meeting of An Chéad Dáil Éireann.

That said, there will be widespread relief and satisfaction that the end of this Fianna Fáil/Green Government is now finally in sight.

He ended:

We have been going through both an economic crisis and a democratic crisis. A totally discredited Fianna Fáil/Green Government has tried to foist on the Irish people a five-year plan of savage cuts and a sell-out IMF/EU deal that will impoverish people in this country for years to come.

The priority of the new Dáil must be to reverse those disastrous measures.

General election 2011 must mark a sea-change in Irish politics.

Sinn Féin will be at the forefront of that change.