Sinn Féin select 25 year old Niall Ó Donnghaile to be Lord Mayor
Niall Ó Donnghaile was only elected to Belfast City Council three weeks ago, but tonight was confirmed as Sinn Féin’s choice for Lord Mayor. He turns 26 at the weekend and is the city’s youngest ever first citizen. Under the d’Hondt rotation, Sinn Féin will get three
Niall is a press officer with Sinn Féin up at the Assembly, and councillor for Pottinger. During his year in office, he’ll be able to welcome Sinn Féin’s Ard Fheis to Belfast’s Waterfront when it visits in September.
Update – Just in case anyone thinks they’ll have trouble pronouncing Niall’s surname, put your fears behind you. Here’s a clip of how Niall says it … or just stick to “Lord Mayor”! (Belfast City Council has a whole webpage devoted to how to address the Lord Mayor in speech and in writing.)
Back in November 2009, I interviewed Niall and we talked about changes East Belfast, how Sinn Féin was developing, as well as what attracted him into the world of politics.
I asked him whether he was hopeful that there would ever be enough of a vote to get a Sinn Féin candidate elected in East Belfast?
I don’t think it’s impossible, especially with what we alluded to earlier on and the changing nature of East Belfast. Once Titanic Quarter is finished, once Sirocco Quays is finished, this constituency is going to be dramatically different in terms of its makeup.
All the parties will be fishing in that pool, not just Sinn Féin. But I would be confident that if we can be strong enough, if we can be articulate enough and relevant enough in East Belfast particularly in relation to the developments that are going to happen behind me, I think eventually you’ll see the numbers there to elect a Sinn Féin representative whoever that may be.
But for me elections are important … If you are a politico like myself, they can be enjoyable and they can be a good experience, but I don’t need to be elected to do work for people on the ground and whether I am elected or unelected that won’t stop me either way. Some people do work to get elected. Others get elected to do work.
You can read the full interview over on Alan in Belfast.
Thanks Trapattoni for this correction. My old memory is not the best. Joe O’Donnell must have lost it in 2005 (or was it 2007) to UUP Philip Robinson
George: Will be great to see the DUP mayor subsequently returning the favour at Easter although expecting he/she to wear a lily might be too much to expect.
Do the Easter ceremonies commemorate both Unionist and Nationalist dead?
Didn’t think so.
Reader,
I thought that the poppy commemorations remembered only those who fought for the British Army. How does the poppy cermonies commemorate nationalist dead?
Deborah Devenny lost the seat in 2005, I think it was actually lost to alliance, I stand to be corrected on that.
You are probably right. Philip Robinson held the seat for UUP up until this 2011 election
dwatch,
Robinson didn’t ‘hold’ anything. He was coopted into Empey’s old seat around a year ago.
My take on Pottinger would be SF took back the seat lost to Alliance in 2005 due to the McCartney murder and Alliance retained their seat by talking the final UUP seat.
Previous council had 3 DUP 1 alliance 1 PUP & 1 UUP
New Council have 3 DUP 1 Alliance 1 PUP & 1 SF
So it is obvious UUP lost a seat and SF gained a seat.
Mark
according to trap Niall has been s.f. rep in the strand for six years, about the time of the McCartney murder, any connection?, also What do you make on his view that the new homes at titanic will get s.f. a assembly seat in east belfast.
ranger1640
I look forward to seeing him at the Cenotaph at Belfast City Hall in July and November.
lets see if we can get his deputy to learn some manners first then you can lecture the mayor on how to reach out to the other side
The election of a Gaeilgeoir as Mayor has shown how far we have progressed since 1969.
“lets see if we can get his deputy to learn some manners first then you can lecture the mayor on how to reach out to the other side”
Carl Marks, I agree Ruth Patterson is an idiot who gives the other unionists a bad name. But now maybe the new SF Mayor and the other SF councillors will learn some manners and pay respect to the James Magennis VC memorial (Northern Ireland’s only Victoria Cross decoration in WW2) just a few feet from the City Hall front door. In 1999 ( when Niall was just 13) SF were the only party who refused to pay respect, support and even attend the unveiling of this memorial to (one of their own) a Catholic from West Belfast who attended St Finan’s the same school as Gerry Adams did. Alban Maginness who was a nationalist SDLP Mayor the previous year, along with other SDLP councillors were the best supporters for getting this memorial erected. In 1999 the next year Bob Stoker UUP was the Mayor who unveiled it. In fact had the Shinners been in the majority back in the late 1990′s the Magennis memorial would never have been erected.
Carl Marks & other republicans, was SF’s silent, objection because the erection to a working class Catholic James Magennis memorial in the grounds of City Hall put to bed all the anti Catholic bigotry crap played out over the years by shinners against Unionists in the City Hall Belfast????
In fact when SF and all their supporters going to pay respect to one of their own and erect a mural in West Belfast in memory to James Magennis VC like the prods of East Belfast have done so here Tullycarnnet
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Joseph_Magennis
This turns all SF’s anti Catholic bigotry propaganda against Prods & Unionists on its head.
New mayor must have been born in 1985(ish?), so will have little or no memory of his party’s “Armed Struggle” up to 1990 – a rather one-sided affair, kind of like Barcelona from last night only with ethnic slaughter. His first news memories were probably kicking in around the time of the “Loyalist backlash” from 1990 onwards. I wonder how that might have skewed his view of what happened overall? Sort of like switching the game on for the last 10 minutes. Otherwise it’s difficult to see how anyone could join or support SF in all conscience.
We’re still living with the trauma of the futile and failed adventure of the Armed Struggle, meted out on the rest of us by the Republican Movement. I think the only sensitive thing SF could do now would be to dissolve its current structure and disconnect entirely from its terrorist past. They could start afresh as a new party with no baggage – more electable surely among nationalists and more acceptable to unionists – and an ability to take an objective and critical approach to the atrocities of Republican terrorists in the 69-98 years. We’re just not getting anything sensible from them yet and it’s 13 years on from Good Friday. We expected more by now. Change of tack needed from them I think.
Maybe this new mayor – I know nowt about him – could be one of a new generation that stands up, questions the past their elders have spun to them and makes that change. Could be a smart political love for Republicans …
Freudian slip – “political love” should read “political move”!! I don’t think love comes into Republican politics much.
You have to laugh at the unionists talking about how experience is required to be Lord Mayor, looking at the number of less than stellar performers they put in the hot seat over the years. Top of the list being Herbert Diddy.
This whole question to me is an example of unionism’s excessive emphasis on symbolism. The Lord Mayor is a purely symbolic post, he has no administrative or leadership role in the council worth talking about. You don’t need “experience” or anything else like that, you just need to have a good personality and get yourself out and about as much as possible. It’s kind of a hard job to screw up.
They could start afresh as a new party with no baggage – more electable surely among nationalists and more acceptable to unionists
The last election shows that SF are eminently electable among Nationalists and likely to become more so. It is the less extremist nationalism of the SDLP that is on the way out.
Making itself acceptable to Unionists is far from SF’s agenda. Perhaps your time would be more usefully employed persuading the proprietors of “Men Only” that they need to drop the pictures of naked women to make their magazine acceptable to feminists. Sounds to me like a good way to go broke.
dwatch while reading back over Niall blog I came accross this, I think they may be of interest to you and some others.
http://glormhicairt.blogspot.com/2010/11/much-has-been-made-of-sdlp-leader.html
The House Negroe and The Field Negroe,I’m A Field Negroe.-Malcolm X
The Greatest Weapon of The Oppressor is The Mind of
The Oppressed-Stiofáin Biko.ANC
Our Greatest Weapon is our Mind-Mairead Farrell-Oglaigh Na hEireann.
Gluaiseacht air Strae.-‘Class distinction is to be seen in the Gaeltacht more than in any other part of Ireland.Marx,Engels and Lenin would have found clear proof of their conviction that the men of property,the Capitalists,are quickest to betray the peoples culture.The poor were the Gaelic speakers.Class hatred burned in me before i ever read a word of Connolly or Das Kapital.When i did read them i understood immediately what they were about.Today the same position holds in Gaelic-speaking Ireland.You have only to look at the way the people of property in the Gaeltacht are killing of the culture and the language of the people.Is their a hatred in the propertied class in the Gaeltacht towards me and my like?Certainly their is.It is not i who affirms the class war.The Hotel Owners carry on this war from from day today,year to year,operating against the lower class and its culture.-M.O.C.-
Connemara Native Máirtín O Cadhain was Black listed from the Gaeltacht Schools and dismissed from his post as in Carn Mor by Bishop O’Doherty.He’d grown up in the Cnocan Glas and had to leave to move to Dublin to work as a Labourer.I remember as a 10 year-old child growing uo on a council estate in Dublin and having to watch my 12 year-old sister getting dragged by the hair along the ground and been called a Nigger.Because she is Black-The experience of The urban ‘field negroe
In 80s Dublin,was not that dissimilar too the experience of the rural field negroes like Martain O’Cadhain in the Gaeltacht speking areas of Connemara in the late 60s.Day to Day.Year to Year.
I’m a Field Negroe-Anto X.
dwatch
in not a republician i dont vote sf nor do i support them interesting hat you think im on for stateing tht the deputy mayor should learn some manners
Niall is a personable young man and easy to get on with (I know him personally). For others on here to say that SF “made up” anti-catholic/republican bias in City Hall is ridiculous! I remember when Alex Maskey became SF’s first councillor (and the ones that followed after him), that whenever they tried to speak, Rhonda and Sammy and co. were blowing whistles, shouting and cat-calling like unruly schoolkids! I also remember George Seawright calling for an incinerator to burn catholics and “throw their priests in along with them” and Sammy congratulating the killers of SF councillor Eddie Fullerton.
im still bemused about dwatchs claim that anti catholic bias in city hall was a invention of sf could anybody produce statistics showing how many catholics were employed by the councill when it was controlled by unionists, i remember that there were figures regarding stormount produced a while ago and and very few if any catholics were working there,
I followed dwatchs link about James Magennis and he should have read it before posting as the reason given for this brave man being ignored be city hall was surpise surpise he was a catholic.
‘I followed dwatchs link about James Magennis and he should have read it before posting as the reason given for this brave man being ignored be city hall was surpise surpise he was a catholic.’
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Joseph_Magennis
Indeed, but the fur coat brigade of Unionists in City Hall Belfast were anti working class (Prod as well as Catholic) back in 1945 in matters such as statues, memorials & the freedom of the City. In 1999 it was the Unionists as well as SDLP nationalists & Alliance who all supported and turned out on the day of the unveiling of the memorial to Magennis.
On that same day not one SF Belfast City Councillor was present. Maybe Carl Marks can explain why???????
“We’re still living with the trauma of the futile and failed adventure of the Armed Struggle, meted out on the rest of us by the Republican Movement.”
They got a mandatory coalition, a veto and the choice to identify as Irish nationalist, none of which was in Sunningdale. May not have been the whole enchilada but it’s better than the rice and beans that even your tribe rejected when it collapsed Sunningdale.
dwatch
On that same day not one SF Belfast City Councillor was present. Maybe Carl Marks can explain why???????
ill type this slowly as u dont seem to be able to keep up IM NOT A SHINNER NOR DO I VOTE FOR THEM maybe you could ask one of them, it is true the fur coat unionists were only interested in workingclass prods when the taigs got uppity but from the formatation of norn iron and before the council as a matter of routine discrimmated against catholics and to claim that this is a figment of sf’s propaganda machine is just silly and shows a blinkered approach to history equaled only by the sort of people that claim the holocaust never happened
C Marks, ok so you say you are not a shinner or dont vote for them. You have done about everything else on this forum to support them and defend their actions regards employing ex IRA terrorist murderers, so I have no option but take your statement with a pinch of salt
This is my last post on this thread, its become so repetitive.
where did i support they employment of anyone please show me
So the Mayor has already been to the Shankill, a week in and he is already proving by his actions that he intends to be a Mayor for all of Belfast.
I remember a contributor here asking about this very issue.
http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/local-national/northern-ireland/belfasts-sinn-fein-mayor-for-presbyterian-event-16007376.html
http://twitter.com/#!/NiallSF
It would appear the Mayor is very comfortable of the Shankill, he’s there again today.
So what do people think of the new Mayor’s term to date???