A huge crowd gathered on a wet Easter Sunday in Stranorlar for the main Easter Commemoration.
The crowd proceeded from St Johnson’s Corner to the execution site of the Drumboe Martyrs on the centenary year of their execution on the 14th March 1923.
Delivering the main address at the site, Sinn Féin TD Pearse Doherty said “We are committed to the Republic that inspired those who went before us.
“The Republic that inspired the Drumboe martyrs.
“The principles of the Proclamation – social justice, equality and democracy – guide our action and the Republic we hope to build.
“After the 2020 election, Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael circled the wagons to keep Sinn Féin out of government and maintain the status quo.
“Since taking office, the most crucial problems pressing down on our people have not been solved; they are getting worse.
A section of the crowd gathering at the execution site at Drumboe.
“The right to secure shelter for citizens and their families has been eroded, chipped away by a housing crisis that was created and has been deepened by Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael.”
Deputy Doherty added that in the Ireland of today we have a generations of our people locked into an insecure and unaffordable rental market.
He added “Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, supported by the Green Party, have chosen to unleash the worst consequences of their housing failure by ending the eviction ban.
“A cruel and inhumane decision, the very antithesis of the Easter Proclamation to which we pledge ourselves today.
“We in Sinn Féin know what side we are on, and whose side we are on.
“We are on the side of equality and social justice; on the side of workers and families; on the side of the people.
“We refuse to accept an economic system that condemns our people to homelessness, to insecurity and poverty.
“We refuse to accept this housing crisis, the dysfunction in our health service, the disempowerment of workers who suffer under this cost of living crisis.”
He said those gathered yesterday remembered the likes of Charlie Daly, Sean Larkin, Daniel Enright and Timothy O’Sullivan, and the many others who dedicated their lives to Irish freedom.
Maria Doherty reading the 1916 Proclamation.
He continued “The Republic they pledged themselves to was a free, equal and united Ireland.
“The Good Friday Agreement provides a peaceful and democratic path to Irish unity – that provision is our right.
“The establishment of a Citizens’ Assembly is urgently required to prepare for constitutional change.
“Our country is changing.
“The unionist majority in the North is gone.
“Today we have a Republican First Minister designate for the first time in our history.
“The people’s demand for change is growing – our responsibility is clear.
“Today we rededicate ourselves to the mission of the Proclamation.
“Irish Republicans today are as committed to that mission as those who have gone before us, those we remember today.”
