The following oration was delivered by a Pádraig Ó Fearghail on behalf of Anti Imperialist Action at the Michael Fagan Commemoration on Sunday May 30 2021 in Collinstown Co Westmeath.
Anti Imperialist Action Ireland would like to thank the Michael Fagan Fenian Society for the invitation to participate in this very well attended and organised event.
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“The soil of Ireland, at present in the possession of an oligarchy, belongs to us, the Irish people, and to us it must be restored.”
This was the stated objective of Fenians in 1867. It remains the objective of Fenians in 2021.
“The right of the people of Ireland to the ownership of Ireland is sovereign and indefeasible. That RIGHT cannnot be extinguished nor can it ever be extinguished except by the destruction of the Irish people.
Rights cannot be voted for or voted away or bargained with. They can only be asserted and fought for.
Michael Fagan asserted Irelands right to independence by taking the fight to those who denied the Irish people their fundamental right to national
sovereignty and independence.
Its important that all Republicans and patriots support the campaign to reintern Michae Fagan and the Invincibles and provide them a fitting memorial.
The objective of Michael Fagan and the Invincibles was a sovereign independent Republic.
Ireland can never be “Shared” with British imperialism or EU and US imperialism for that matter. The Republican objective was and remains a sovereign, seperatist Republic. Not an internal settlement which legitimises British rule in Ireland.
Today in 2021 partition and the British border in Ireland remains the primary contradiction in Ireland. Ultimately the national question has still yet to be resolved before any social, economic or cultural issue can be fundamentally resolved.
Ireland was shackled by Britain. This stunted its natural developnent in every way and nearly destroyed our national culture and heritage . The partition and occupation now fundamentally impacts every aspect of life in Ireland by denying natural democratic and class politics and promotes a carnival of reaction on both sides of the British border.
Civil War parties and civil war politics will continue to dominant thr political landscape so long as British occupation exists. This is the lesson of history for 100 years.
For anyone who believes that British imperialism and occupation will simply whither away and its only a matter of time before they disengage from Ireland need only look to last week where a team of Belfast employees celebrated their contribution to the British Royal Navy’s latest flagship vessel after the £3 billion aircraft carrier set sail.
Workers at the Thales site in Belfast designed and manufactured one of the key assets protecting the new 65,000-tonne vessel – a missile system on the Navy’s Wildcat helicopter.
Ireland remains a military garrison for Britain and it is a base where it launches their wars and proxy wars if conquest across the globe.
Mi5 agent, former RUC boss and now Garda boss personally oversaw the training of security forces in the dictatorship of Oman where protests have broken out against thei regime there backed up by British Imperialism .
It is because of this relationship with Britian the Fenians, the Invincibles and Michael Fagan understood there could be no peaceful coexistence with imperialism.
Michael Fagan was not a victim. He was a Freedom Fighter and a hero to the Irish people.
At the time he was called a murderere and a terrorist. Even to this day parts of the Free State establishment refer to the Phoneix park assassinations as murders. I have personal experience of a guided tour of Glasnevin where the have been referred to as the Phoenix Park murders.
The mindset of the Free State garrison class who seized power in 1922 was one of acquense and subservience. That mindset still exists but now these sycophants bow to not only British interests but European, US, Canadian and Chinese interests above their own peoples. This generation will be worse off than previous generations. Not being able to afford a home, proper health care some attending temporary schools and then living in temporary accommodation.
The misery of children living in hotels and of refugees living in direct provision is what contributes to the huge profits taken by the native Irish garrison class off of the irish people.
They share their spoils with the international financiers who are buying up housing units and land across the country and will rent it to back to the Irish people at extortion rents and rack in huge profits.
Ireland is considered a suitable subject for sale or barter by the two states in this country.
Over 100 years since the 1916 Rising Ireland once again remains caught between two imperialist blocs and denied its national independence and right to self determination. In 2021 the rallying cry has to be We Serve Neither the EU nor the British Crown.
I would like to thank the Michael Fagan Society for inviting me to speak here today.
I’d like to send solidarity to the Palestinian resistance and salute their tactical victory against Zionist in the great Palestinian revolt if 2021 which will go down in history.
Having established a united front encompassing all of the Resistance organisations and movements in Palestine they have achieved what the Zionists have stated was impossible. They, along with all imperialists are paper tigers.
In honour of Michael Fagan I would like to end with a quote from that great anti imperialist Roger Casement
“Ireland has outlived the failure of all her hopes — and she still hopes. Ireland has seen her sons — aye, and her daughters too! — suffer from generation to generation, always for the same cause, meeting always the same fate, and always at the hands of the same power. Still, always a fresh generation has passed on to withstand the same oppression. For if English authority be omnipotent — a power, as Mr Gladstone phrased it, that reaches to the very ends of the earth — Irish hope exceeds the dimensions of that power, excels its authority, and renews with each generation the claims of the last. The cause that begets this indomitable persistency, the faculty of preserving through centuries of misery the remembrance of lost liberty — this surely is the noblest cause ever man strove for, ever lived for, ever died for.”
Beir bua.