Martin claims FF is ‘true republican party’

FIANNA Fáil will defend its position as the “true republican party” against what leader Micheál Martin described as “recent converts” to democracy.

In a thinly veiled attack on Sinn Féin, against whom Fianna Fáil is battling to become the most relevant party of opposition, he criticised those who had “espoused military republicanism” during the conflict in the North — they “served no purpose but to shore-up partition and inflict unnecessary misery on ordinary people.”

This was in contrast to the “immense accomplishments of our party, as a republican movement, in delivering the fullest measure of Irish sovereignty and working for the essential peace and unity of our island.”