Two Garda McCabes and the two faces of Sinn Féin

IN a rollercoaster week of political turmoil, unending contradictions and rhetorical backflipping only two groups have emerged with credibility: firstly, Garda whistleblowers – epitomised by the stoical dignity of Sergeant Maurice McCabe and his wife Lorraine – have demonstrated how to face down calumny and adversity. In the words of Michelle Obama: ‘When they go low we go high.’ The McCabes went high.

Secondly, the Irish media, print and broadcast, have come into their own, demonstrating that speaking truth to power – be it on the health service or corruption in our state agencies – is the type of serious journalism the Irish people believe in and are proud of.

I know politics is politics but there have been some bizarre positions adopted by our main political parties.

Tuesday’s Liveline was dominated by Fine Gael councillors tearing strips off each other about whether the party leader should continue. When a snap text poll on the programme revealed that 56% wanted the Taoiseach to go, one FG councillor expressed disappointment that the figure wasn’t higher!

The Fianna Fáil party managed to ride more horses in the one day than AP McCoy, first calling the Government ‘incoherent and shambolic’ while in the next breath pledging they would ‘ensure it survives’.

Inadvertently on a number of occasions this week callers to Liveline said ‘Jerry McCabe’ when they meant Maurice McCabe. They were, of course, confusing him with another Garda hero, Detective Jerry McCabe, who was shot dead in cold blood by the IRA as he sat in his car in Adare, Co. Limerick, in June 1996.

Ironically Sinn Féin is to the fore in championing the just case of Sergeant Maurice McCabe.

Last Monday afternoon, An Phoblacht – a newspaper that not too long ago gloried in the slaughter of members of the security forces by the IRA – was writing in detail on its website about the ‘private meeting’ that senior Sinn Féin figures had had with Garda McCabe that day. The article, of course, then turned into a Government-bashing exercise.

That members of Sinn Féin currently so vocal in their support for a wronged Garda were campaigning for the early release of the killers of Jerry McCabe a few years ago has brought irony to new levels.

But that’s politics, I suppose, and the new Sinn Féin is very, very good at it.

Only last week, Sinn Féin leader Gerry Adams, speaking in Dublin, said: ‘The armed campaign did have popular support at the time.’

Where is the evidence that Irish people supported the murder of gardaí, soldiers and civilians?

Indeed, Sinn Féin could not win a single seat in the Republic between 1961 and 1997 – and has only gained electoral traction North and South since the so-called ‘armed campaign’ ended.

The inquiry into what happened Maurice McCabe and other Garda whistleblowers is very straightforward – it does not require Sherlock Holmes to answer the basic questions that lie at the heart of this scandal.

Unlike previous tribunals it should be short, time-limited and focused, and not become a goldplated retirement package for barristers and solicitors.