10 hours ago
- Politics
- Irish Independent
Irish language signs ‘must be a part of our future' in Northern Ireland, says Michelle O'Neill
The First Minister was speaking at Sinn Fein's annual Wolfe Tone Commemoration at Bodenstown, Co Kildare, on Sunday.
Sinn Fein's Stormont leader also said work on Casement Park in west Belfast must begin 'now', despite a funding shortfall in the tens of millions remaining.
There has also been much recent controversy over plans to install signage in Irish in Belfast's new transport hub, with unionists heavily opposed to the idea.
Ms O'Neill told republicans gathered at the final resting place of Tone, 'the father of Irish republicanism', that she was 'honoured to serve as First Minister for all, committed to power-sharing and to progress, and committed to representing all equally'.
'Acht na Gaeilge is now a reality and in the coming months the Irish Language Commissioner will be appointed,' she said.
'And in a fair and balanced way Irish language signs such as those in Grand Central Station must be part of our future.
'Additional funding was secured for Casement Park which creates renewed momentum. The work must now begin. This is a vital project not just for west Belfast, not just for the GAA, but for sports more widely in the north and across the island.
'A top class sporting stadium is a win for all. Sinn Féin is committed to investing in all sporting codes. Casement Park will be built.'
Ms O'Neill also said it was time to extend voting rights in Irish presidential elections to Irish citizens in Northern Ireland. The Assembly recently passed a Sinn Féin non-binding motion to do so, although the Aontú party in the Republic had already submitted a private member's bill on the same matter in Dublin.
Ms O'Neill said the vote in Stormont to extend the vote north of the border was 'something unthinkable only a short number of years ago'.
'But it is a sign of confidence in our future. A sign of things changing for the better,' she said.
'A similar motion will be debated in the Dáil this coming week.
'It is a decade since a bill was first passed in the Dáil, but it has been blocked by successive governments.
'Now is the time to act. Now is the time to extend voting rights to Irish citizens in the north.'
Ms O'Neill also condemned recent racially-motivated rioting in Ballymena, Portadown and elsewhere as 'raw, unadulterated racism, fuelled by sectarian, supremacist loyalism, involving, in many cases, paramilitary elements, much of which was mirroring ultra-right English nationalism'.
She also described the Northern Ireland government's Legacy Act as 'fundamentally flawed and it is a cynical piece of legislation' and called for an immediate public inquiry into the murder of GAA official Sean Brown, who was murdered by loyalists in 1997.
