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.”

Speaking at the annual Sean Moylan commemoration at Kiskeam in Cork, Mr Martin said it was time to “reaffirm Fianna Fáil’s position as the party of educational opportunity for all.”

There will be “huge damage” he said if proposed cuts to education are implemented in the budget.

Education is a “core value” of Fianna Fáil, he said, and it will challenge the Government on “cutting teacher numbers, cutting special needs assistants, increasing class sizes, reducing the number of years of second-level education and preventing children from starting school at four.”

Speaking about the 1916 leaders, he said Fianna Fáil has ” always been a progressive, constitutional republican party” and ” this is an analysis which we will continue to advocate and we will defend its validity against those who are recent converts to fully democratic principles.”

He told the gathering that the party had been “unceasing in our contempt” for those who “were deaf to the mass support of the Irish people for non-violent republicanism.”

As Ireland changes over the coming years, he said there is a “vital place” in the political landscape for “an open and inclusive republican party that is people-centred, that stands for equality and fairness in Irish life and that unequivocally respects and upholds the rule of law.

“Fianna Fáil is the party that offers distinct republican analysis to the Irish people,” he said.