An elected official from Northern Ireland recently drummed up support for Irish unification among Cleveland’s sizable Irish-American community.
Dáire Hughes, a member of the U.K. parliament, belongs to Sinn Féin, a political party in both Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. He told 270 people gathered at the West Side Irish American Club in Olmsted Township this month that the time has come to create one nation on the island of Ireland.
“We can be the first generation to live in a free and united Ireland,” Hughes said.
He said the 1998 Good Friday Agreement brokered by former U.S. Sen. George Marshall has delivered “27 years of relative peace and progress,” and he urged the Americans in the room to reach out to their elected officials to push for U.S. support for reunification. He credited “Irish America” with pushing for the Good Friday Agreement.
That deal, Hughes said, provides for a unity referendum, and he believes now is the time to push for one.
With an unspoken nod to Sinn Féin’s historic ties to the Irish Republican Army and “The Troubles” that rocked North Ireland for most of the 20th century, he promised that the rights of all will be protected.
“There is no place for sectarianism in a united Ireland,” he said. “The North is a shared place. We now have a pathway and a potential for a united Ireland.”
He said Brexit, the U.K.’s 2016 vote to withdraw from the European Union, sparked the current drive to unite the island of Ireland. The majority of voters in Northern Ireland wanted to remain in the EU.
When an audience member asked why Hughes came to Cleveland to kick off this reunification campaign, a hint of the Blarney crept in: “Because of all you lovely people.”
John O’Brien, Jr., publisher and editor of iIrish, a monthly newsmagazine produced in Cleveland, led the conversation with Hughes. He said he attended the Irish Unity Summit in New York in April and offered to host an event.
Sinn Féin has long had friends in Cleveland. In 1995, Gerry Adams, then-leader of the party, held a fundraiser at the club that drew more than 400 people.
