That
the writings of Jude Collins are now being openly
discussed by people other than Jude himself must
come as a fillip to his artistic pride. With journalists
such as Ed Moloney - who was up to his neck in the
dangerous quagmire that invariably accompanies serious
investigative reporting, while Jude was writing
about getting his washing machine fixed - commenting
on what he writes, might mark in Jude's mind a coming
of age. Plodding away for decades with nobody giving
a toss, other than to possess some faint awareness
of the writers name and absolutely nothing of what
is written, can quickly demoralise the scribe. A
fragile self-image may find it difficult to cope
with obscurity.
Jude's
appearance in the pages of Daily Ireland led me
to suspect that the wily Noel Doran at the Irish
News had decided to torpedo his paper's new rival
by offering to nourish it with his own dead leaves.
The story goes that the equally shrewd Mairtin O
Muilleoir's first poaching target in the Doran enterprise
was Brian Feeney. Feeney, assured of a much wider
readership where he was, opted to stay. Jude, calculating
that he may as well be not read in Daily Ireland
as not read in the Irish News, made the switch.
While none yet can point to the 'Jude factor' as
being responsible for Daily Ireland's downturn and
the announcement of twelve lay offs, insipid columnists
and high sales don't mix.
I
can't claim to be either particularly hostile or
endeared to Jude's writing. Apart from his quaint
views on demographics, there is little that stands
out from his columns on which I could draw for an
answer if pressed in a pub quiz. Selfishly, admittedly,
I do recall him once objecting to a PSNI raid on
my home coupled with a defence of the right of people
to both hold and give vent to alternative points
of view. Admirable traits certainly - but what about
their stamina?
In
his bid to become Prefect for the Congregation for
the Doctrine of the Leadership over at Daily Ireland
Cardinal Jude has taken to launching attacks on
those who are at odds with such concepts as presidential
infallibility. I was sufficiently interested to
learn that he had penned a column in defence of
the Provisional leadership in which I was the focus
of the inquisitorial cleansing, that I bought a
copy of Daily Ireland on my way through town. Good
for the Cardinal; the very man to unravel the mysterium
iniquitatis that sits like some dark halo around
the necks of those who have the audacity to disbelieve.
I
can hardly feign affront at being attacked by defenders
of the line. This challenge was at least writerly,
unlike that launched by the two finalists in the
party idiot of the year competition I had encountered
as I sauntered nonchalantly through the Whiterock
only thirty minutes prior to reading the Cardinal's
piece. Vainly trying to decipher what 'ug' and 'duh'
repeated ad infinitum was supposed to mean, I had
little option other than conclude stupidity is a
privilege some are happy to abuse.
The
first thing that struck me when reading Jude's encyclopaedic
insight 'Agreement is the greatest threat to unionism'
was that its author makes a common error in privileging
a perspective less because of what it says and more
because of who says it. There is a perilous kow-towing
to elitism on the part of those who contend that
because someone spends time in prison their ideas
'deserve to be heard.' Any more so than the next
person's?
Worse
was to come. Is Jude Collins serious, just having
us on, or shamelessly sucking up to Sinn Fein leaders
when he disputes the existence of evidence flagging
up the lack of internal debate within Sinn Fein?
To use that great phrase from Abba Eban, it seems
that what is truly encyclopaedic about Jude is his
ignorance. Was the Bobby Sands Discussion Group
not closed down after it had hosted a debate in
Derry in which awkward questions were asked of the
leadership? Have party members not been subject
to strict censorship enforced by the leadership
and its thought police? Were John Kelly, Martin
Cunningham, Tommy Gorman, Brendan Hughes et al simply
making it up when they complained about the suppression
of ideas and a dictatorial leadership intent on
smothering discussion? Did the former Sinn Fein
councillor for South Belfast not openly admit to
the journalist Anton McCabe that he had sabotaged
a speaking engagement at Queens University because
the panel was comprised of four former Blanketmen
not at one with the party line? Was Alex Maskey
spoofing when he claimed that he and two others
alone took the contentious decision to attend commemorations
for British war dead? Was Jim Gibney pretending
when he said the leadership had stretched itself
dangerously far over the first round of decommissioning
and had moved too far ahead of its grassroots which
it had not consulted in advance but had briefed
after the fact? Did we all just imagine there was
no extensive consultation prior to the first ceasefire?
None
of the above even begins to address the panoply
of violent measures employed by the Provisional
leadership to ensure alternatives do not emerge,
which range from kidnappings to murder. In a later
article we find Jude Collins telling us 'journalists
have a duty to search out the truth in important
news stories and report them accordingly.' If even
he ignores what he has to say, what chance of others
paying much attention?
The
Cardinal contends that the Good Friday Agreement
was not a defeat for republicanism. Which does little
to explain why Jim Gibney informed his Whiterock
Road audience in 1998 that from a strict republican
perspective the Agreement should be thrown in the
bin; that it could only be considered progressive
within a strictly constitutional nationalist framework
and on those grounds alone the party would go for
it. Nor does Jude Collin's logic sit well alongside
the most positive thing that could be said for it
by a leading Sinn Fein member in Conway Mill the
same year - a transition to a transition. Equally
ignored in the Collins article is Mitchel McLaughlin's
admission in Parliamentary Brief that the Agreement
legitimised British rule. Examples of the GFA's
deficit are legion - Jude Collins, again ignoring
his own advice, never tried to find any.
In
disputing the contention that there is no republican
framework within the Good Friday Agreement that would lead to
a united Ireland Jude Collins manages to misquote
Jim Molyneaux, UUP leader at the time of the first
IRA ceasefire. Molyneaux merely claimed that the
ceasefire had destabilised unionism. Writers fond
of citing this in favour of the 'GFA is a stepping
stone to United Ireland' position invariably fail
to tell us that Molyneaux explained why the ceasefire
was destabilising; insisting that it was beyond
his ken why republicans sold a horse and bought
a saddle. Or as Stephen King puts it, unionism was
confounded as to why republicans had fought so hard
just to settle for so little. Eleven years after
the 1994 ceasefire and the Molyneaux observations,
we can find Eric Waugh mocking republicans: 'the
old ideal of unity is more remote than ever. Unionists
are not interested.' Even one as hostile to the
agreement as Jeffrey Donaldson can still claim republicanism
was 'defeated by a partitionist settlement, based
on the concession of self-determination of Northern
Ireland.' Against all this we have the bizarre spectacle
of Cardinal Jude citing Paisley as evidence for
movement to a united Ireland. Sure, if any of us
were to take the ranting reverend seriously, we
would find ourselves believing that the late pope
was the anti-Christ.
Jude
Collins manages to lose himself when he refutes
the notion that republican leaders have amassed
power and prosperity for themselves. Checking the
books, as suggested by the Cardinal, might prove
revealing if it were a matter of personal corruption
at leadership level. But rather than that being
the charge, it is one of an identifiable power and
wealth disparity having emerged between the republican
leadership and those they lead. Perhaps the Cardinal
should take a look at today's graffiti in West Belfast
stating 'Join Sinn Fein - Get two houses.'
Telling
us that Irish republicanism hasn't been this strong
since the 1920s because Sinn Fein has more votes
than previously is laughable. Are there now more
socialists in England than ever before because of
the size of the Blair vote? Perhaps the Cardinal
just gets confused. He does write fiction; publishes
novels in fact. Maybe, inadvertently, he put the
facts in his novels and the fiction in his political
columns.
The
scramble head approach is evident when Jude Collins
assumes to speak authoritatively on behalf of nationalist
Ireland when claiming that this broad section of
opinion is sick of my perspective. One would imagine
after the Cardinal tried speaking on behalf of those
twenty per cent of unionists who he claimed favoured
a United Ireland, he would refrain from acting as
spokesperson for large bodies of opinion. His evidence
- one e-mail, which he received from a Protestant,
but only after he had made his inane claim. Nor
does he manage to square this twenty per cent,
that he alone knows about, with his latest political
idea that 'there is the occasional Billy Leonard
who crosses the unionist-nationalist divide, but
99 per cent of us stay on the side we were born
into.' From twenty per cent to one per cent of Protestants
willing to embrace a united Ireland - hardly evidence
of republican success.
Furthermore,
I would be the last person to challenge the right
of Jude Collins to defend the leadership of armed
nationalism. But I am puzzled why he would wish
to serve as literary outrider for it now when its
guns are turned only on people from within its own
community? Seems that the Cardinal has absolutely
no intention of answering his own question, 'who
will protect the public from their politicians?'
As
for Jude Collins' contention that I am standing
on the coffin of Robert McCartney, let 'nationalist
Ireland' make up its own mind about that rather
than have the Cardinal look into his own heart to
tell us what the people think. Just how many republican
coffins did Jude Collins refuse to stand beside
when there was a price to pay for doing so? If Cardinal
Jude wants to lead the Congregation for the Doctrine
of the Leadership and assume the mantle of the literary
equivalent of the ceasefire soldier he should at
least be honest about it, rather than mask his aspirations
in the false narrative of political advancement.
There was a time to rub shoulders with the boys
- when they stood in the Bearna Baoil, the gap of
danger, rather than in the gap of deceit and diesel.
