IRSP: In Memory of Seamus Costello

[Danielle Ni Dhighe <danielle@xxxxxxxx>]

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

4 October 2003
Irish Republican Socialist Party
International Department

In Memory of Seamus Costello

At the funeral of Seamus Costello, Nora Connolly-O'Brien, daughter of
Ireland's greatest Marxist revolutionary leader and herself a life-
long activist, republican, and socialist, said of the fallen IRSP
leader: "He was the only one who truly understood what James Connolly
meant when he spoke of his vision of the freedom of the Irish
people."

The greatest interpreter of the political brilliance of James
Connolly alive in Ireland at the time, the "Boy General", a man
elected to the Wicklow County Council, County Wicklow Committee of
Agriculture, General Council of Committees of Agriculture, Eastern
Regional Development Organisation, National Museum Development
Committee, Bray Urban District Council, Bray Branch of the Irish
Transport and General Workers Union, Bray and District Trade Unions
Council (President 1976-77), the Cualann Historical Society,
Chairperson of the IRSP, and Chief of Staff of the INLA, lay dead at
the hands of the Official IRA.

Just three years after founding the Irish Republican Socialist
Movement, Seamus Costello was dead and buried.

The Garda and Special Branch attacked the party's offices, assaulted
its members, and arrested 40 of its leading members. Our second
chairperson and a gifted mass leader, Miriam Daly, was stolen away
from us a brief three years later, murdered by the SAS masquerading as
loyalist thugs, and within months of her murder, the intelligent,
energetic, and capable Ronnie Bunting and Noel Little too were felled
by SAS assassins. In 1981 the loss of O'Hara, Lynch, and Devine alone
would have been a devastating to many movements, but we lost a number
of others in shoot-to-kill murders by the state, death on active
service, and mass arrests on the evidence of super-grass perjurers.

The smoke from the cordite slowly cleared and the IRSP and INLA were
still standing.  Bruised and bloodied, but with head unbowed; we
were still standing.

The sight of that must have been quite vexing for some. It must
have driven some malignant mind within the pack of snarling dogs the
system of capitalism maintains to the limit of his patience. Because
then a collection of ex-members of our movement, who generally
couldn't stand the sight of each other, were seized up and brought
together for no good purpose, christened the IPLO, armed and sent to
destroy this movement by equal parts senseless violence and shameless
misrepresentation. If the death of comrades of the stature of Ta
Power and others had not done damage enough, the droning chant of the
word "feud" in the capitalist media and by erstwhile Irish
republicans now dressed up in the ill-fitting clothes of politicians
and statesmen served to besmirch the proud name of the Irish
Republican Socialist Movement to such an extent that reactionaries
and curs felt capable of attempting to take away from us our
association with our founding chairperson and tireless leader.

We saw to it, comrades, that they did not succeed.

But we did reel in a prolonged and bleak period of darkness. Fear
kept comrades behind locked doors, party stalwarts formed external
discussion groups and took brief sabbaticals from party activism.
What was left of the movement was chiefly the prisoners of war and the
supporters abroad, assisted by a mere handful of party members and
prisoners' relatives, who leaned heavily on the volunteers of the
INLA to ensure that the very name of our party did not disappear from
the annuls of Irish republicanism.

Out of that darkness stepped yet another intelligent, brave, and
charismatic individual, the latest in a list far too long for such a
tiny party, struggling to remain alive on the revolutionary margins
of Irish politics. And once again, the party comrades and the INLA's
volunteers, the prisoners of war, the recently ex-prisoners, and the
scattered supporters abroad returned to raise our standard, the
Starry Plough, once again. I recall that a good comrade of mine said
to me, "once more into the breech, my old friend."

And as surely as any keen observer of Irish history might have
predicted, a handful of wasters seized the blood money offered by the
enemies of our nation and our class and killed yet another leader of
the Irish Republican Socialist Movement, but this time that movement
did not waver, not even for a moment. This time, despite the lies and
slander spewed forth in the press, despite the deliberate efforts to
re-tar our movement with the charge of feuding, despite the blood of
yet another martyr who had restored our pride and determination,
despite all this, we did not stagger and we did not reel. We did not
bow our heads, but kept marching forward. This time we did not allow
ourselves to be bullied by lesser men with more weapons and we did
not retreat to the safety of the political sidelines. And we have not
done so yet. We continue to march forward, sure in our allegiance to
the working class; sure in our commitment to the class war which is
its right and duty to wage; sure that we are following in the
footsteps of giants and that we are forcing ourselves to grow with
every step so that we might fill those footprints.

Reactionaries and cowards killed Seamus Costello, comrades and
friends. Ever since that day, their allies have sought to destroy
Seamus's legacy, which is the Irish Republican Socialist Movement.
But we who have been orphaned more times than we can count have come
of age. There has been a fitting memorial built to the founder of our
movement and that memorial is that very movement which he helped to
forge. We have come through a baptism of fire and blood and wind and
storm, and as we stand here today we serve as a living commemoration
of Seamus Costello's memory.

We have openly admitted our mistakes. We have found the courage to
mend those parts of our movement that had, in haste, been constructed
poorly. We have had the courage of our convictions sufficient to
stand not on the trappings of a heroic but at times ill-guided
history of struggle in arms nor in the glittering ornaments of
bourgeois respectability. No, rather we have found our strength in
the reality of the honour and justice inherent in the struggle of our
class for its liberation, as women and men. We have found our footing
by keeping our feet firmly on the earth, our heads proudly in the
air, and our eyes fixed upon the goals of equality, justice,
liberation, human dignity, cooperation, mutual concern, and genuine
compassion and concern for all those who suffer and languish under
the heel of oppression.

Look around us here today; see the comrades that you have around you
today. That we are here at all is a worthy tribute to Seamus Costello.
That we return each year to honour the memory of this leader and
champion of Ireland's working people, testifies to the accomplishment
of this heir to the tradition of Connolly. And, comrades, remember as
you leave this graveyard today, that this grave may contain the flesh
and blood of Seamus Costello, but that his spirit soars in every
corner of this island where the Starry Plough ripples in the breeze.
We will not simply respect the memory of Seamus Costello; we will
live it. We have come to this grave-side today to say to the world at
large, we are the children of Connolly, of Larkin, of Costello, but
we are now grown and standing on our own feet. But, as long as the
IRSP continues its fight to liberate its nation and its class, Seamus
Costello yet lives and breathes.

Long Live the Spirit of Connolly!

Long Live the Spirit of Costello!

Long Live the Irish Republican Socialist Movement!

###

Republican Socialist Publicity Bureau
392 Falls Road, Belfast, BT48 6DH, Ireland
Tel: 028 90 321024 Fax: 028 90 330786
http://www.irsm.org/irsm.html



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