Issue 038, Saoirse: Irish Freedom (June, 1990)

              30p usa 22 per year uimh 38 meitheamh - june 1990 issn 0791 - 0002 bulk rate us postage paid hummel dist corp return address saoirse box 1053 south orange n.j 07079 wolff tom june 10,1990 sunday speaker : des long dublin bus leaves 13 aston place 1pm bodenstown function ballads and traditional music west county hotel chapelizod dublin 8 - 11pm sunday june 10 tdille 2.50 brooke's plan aims to keep british rule set up a new stormont nominal say for dublin ruc terrorism — are nationalists in the six counties to be abandoned to stormont again ? with the current round of talks between british secretary of state brooke the dublin administration the sdlp and the unionists over at the beginning of june and another round soon to begin it is clear that a new sell-out of the democratic demand for irish self-determination as a unit is on the way during the last week of may it became obvious that the two unionist leaders ian paisley and james molyneaux had secured the suspension of the anglo-irish conference and the maryfield secretariat beginning next september and set to last for two months which they can present to their followers as the ditching of the 1 985 hillsborough deal on the other hand leinster house politicians in dublin and the sdlp will offer to their supporters the fact that the unionists have agreed to talk directly to the dublin administration after having first arranged a new stormont in negot iations with the sdlp in the six coun ties this will be presented to the irish people as a role in the running of the six counties for dublin . the sunday press of may 27 may call this a meaningful role but republicans will be able to see through the propagan da thickets to distinguish the essential features of this hillsborough deal mark ii british rule remains ; another stor mont is to be constructed ; and the sdlp and dublin are to be given nominal parti cipation to disguise another betrayal of the six-county nationalists we can instantly ask what meaning ful role has existed since 1985 and what benefits have flowed to the northern nationalists in the intervening five years ? in reality britain is engaged in selling another internal solution dressed up with a new title and the endorsement of the revisionist elite in dublin and there by condemning the irish people to a con tinuation of oppression and suffering articles 2 and 3 the bargain price this time for the 26 county state however appears to include along with slot-machine extradition the removal of articles 2 and 3 of the free state constitution this was framed in 1937 by fianna fail leader eamon de valera and sold in the referendum that year as a new constitution for all ireland removing articles 2 and 3 now would in effect mean a re-enactment of the boundary agreement of 1925 what free state leader cosgrave called the damn good bargain - renouncing the six counties accepting they are part of britain and abandoning the northern nationalists once again to a stormont regime slap in the face this would be a slap in the face to the long-suffering people of the six counties and it must be fought against for that reason the clamour for the removal of articles 2 and 3 by the pds fine gael etc is predictable but the soundings within fianna fail have already sent shock tre mors going through that organisation on the ground british direct ruler brooke the estimated 15 per cent of delegates who were absent at this year's ff ard fheis and the reduced national collec tion during may are only two signs of grass-roots disillusionment many are now asking what was the reason for setting up fianna fail in the first place if a return to the boundary agreement is being con sidered ? republicans know that the national right to self-determination and the ex pression of it goes back at least to the united irishmen of the 1790s and wolfe tone whom we honour this month but we also reject any attempts to divide the irish people and label the six counties as a foreign country whose citizens do not concern us that may be the logic of par titionism and the 26-county state but it is not a step forward it is part along with the current moves to restore stormont of the latest attempt to update and re-structure british rule in ireland and to make the irish people accept it wolfe tone would have none of it and neither will we