Terrible anniversary of Enniskillen bomb reminds us of why Gerry Adams needs to go and go now

IF the Enniskillen bombing seems like a long time ago, that’s because it is. It was 30 years ago yesterday, after all, when the IRA triggered a 40lb bomb right beside the cenotaph, just as the Protestant people of the town gathered on Remembrance Sunday to pay their respects to the war dead.

When the bomb exploded at 10.43am, before the military parade had actually started, it took 11 lives in its blast. And injured more than 60, including schoolmaster Ronnie Hill, who remained in a coma for another 13 years before death finally overcame him.

Included among the dead that day were three married couples and the young woman who became something of a symbol of the bombing – 20-year-old Marie Wilson – largely due to the nobility of her bereaved father, Gordon, illustrated by the extraordinary way in which he conducted himself in the immediate aftermath of the attack, and in the years that followed.

Three decades is a long time. Not for those who lost loved ones that day, of course, because all those who gathered again yesterday in their own personal act of remembrance must still feel the loss as if it had occurred only yesterday. Time heals, people say – generally people who have never been bereaved.

Speculation

But put it into a timeline context of ordinary living for the rest of us, however, and the 1987 Enniskillen bombing seems like a lifetime ago.

Reagan was in Berlin that year, telling Gorbachev to ‘tear down this wall’; 16 people were murdered in Hungerford; Terry Waite was kidnapped in Beirut; The Simpsons got its first ever airing on television; U2 were singing With Or Without You; Glenn Close was terrorising Michael Douglas and boiling bunnies in Fatal Attraction.

And Gerry Adams had already been president of Sinn Féin for four years. Next Monday he’ll be 34 years at the helm.

A lot could happen, however, between now and then.

This weekend sees Sinn Féin gather for its ard fheis and with speculation simmering about the leadership for some time now, it may well reach boiling point in the next few days.

Why? Because Gerry Adams pronounced a few months ago that, come the November ard fheis, he would shed some light on what he called the ‘planned process of generational change’.

Not that we should lose the run of ourselves with expectation. He would still be putting his name forward for election, he also said.

Nonetheless, it does seem that, at last, some shift is in the pipeline. And not before time.

The party has shown in recent times that it now has an appeal for a section of the electorate that, heretofore, would have run a mile from Sinn Féin.

The Mary Lou factor has undoubtedly contributed to that turnaround. With her straight-talking approach, her obvious ability, her middle-class Dublin pedigree and her lack of terrorist baggage, there is, for a whole new swathe of voters, much to like.

With Pearse Doherty – surely one of Sinn Féin’s most able operators – having ruled himself out some time ago when it comes to presidential office, it’s all, it now seems, about Mary Lou. And as vicepresident of the party already, she is surely a shoo-in for the top job.

Or is she?

Foolish

First of all, Gerry Adams has to go. As the longest-serving president of Sinn Féin, by no small margin, he has certainly done his party some service. And complex as his own background undoubtedly is, it would be foolish to suggest that the Northern peace process could have succeeded without him onboard – albeit with the astute Martin McGuinness whispering in his ear.

Indeed, while the Enniskillen bombing was unquestionably a tragedy for so many, wrecking lives for decades to come, it also represented something of a turning point in the North. With the IRA admitting that the killing of civilians that day was a mistake – ‘a monumental error’, according to An Phoblacht at the time – the tragedy also speeded up the sanctioning of extradition, no longer giving terrorists any hiding place in the Republic. And it prompted, too, another significant development with the resumption of the all-important talks between Gerry Adams and John Hume.

We have come a long way on this island since that bomb exploded that Sunday morning three decades ago. And Sinn Féin has also moved – but not yet far enough. For until Gerry Adams, so representative of the old guard, is gone from the frontline of the party, that final leap will never be made by the wider electorate.

Which brings us back to Mary Lou McDonald. An extremely able politician, she does not want a presidential coronation, she says.

She is right to be wary of such optics. The ‘appointment’ of Michelle O’Neill as leader in the North smacked far too much – and still does – of Sinn Féin-style puppetry.

‘How did that wee girl get the job?’ someone of the Catholic faith asked dismissively in my company in the North after Ms O’Neill took over the Martin McGuinness role. And in that question lies danger for Mary Lou McDonald. She is, after all, a woman. And when it comes to Sinn Féin, being able to play the Northern card carries weight.

There are those, indeed, who suggest that Sinn Féin is still hugely influenced by a West Belfast clique. Were that true, then, while Mary Lou is no ‘wee girl’ and has been involved in Northern talks on many occasions, she is still not ‘of’ the North.

History

So is she really a shoo-in for the presidency? There are those who argue that there is nothing surer.

But even if that’s the case, history would point to the fact that there is no guaranteed political success for her. Indeed, quite the opposite, because for those deemed to be designated successors, the garden, when they get there, is not always so rosy.

Just look at Gordon Brown in the UK. And even Peter Robinson, a man who waited half his life to take over the reins from Ian Paisley, only to come to the job when, for him, it was really too late.

But if not Mary Lou McDonald, and with Pearse Doherty counting himself out of the reckoning, then who?

Don’t discount Eoin Ó Broin. Supersmart and an extremely able debater, he was only 15 when that bomb went off in Enniskillen. Yes, he’s a Blackrock College boy, something that might raise more than a sniff or two in West Belfast, but he’s also walked the walk in that city, studying for his postgraduate degree at Queen’s University and serving as a city councillor for a number of years.

Thirty years ago, Enniskillen prompted a tilting of the IRA axis. Three decades on and Sinn Féin now looks set to adjust its own.

The king is dead. We all know that. It’s time that the king himself accepted it, and stepped down from the throne.

This weekend would be as good a time as any.