RTÉ Radio 1
*To hear clips of the programme please contact Sandra Byrne, RTÉ Radio Press Office *
MARTIN FERRIS TD AND DAUGHTER TOIREASA IN FRANK AND REVEALING INTERVIEW WITH MIRIAM O’CALLAGHAN
Miriam Callaghan’s guests on RTÉ Radio 1 at 10am this Sunday are Sinn Féin TD for Kerry North Martin Ferris and his daughter, Sinn Féin Councillor Toireasa Ferris.
In a frank and revealing interview Martin Ferris talks about his journey from IRA Republican activist as a young man through his years on the run and in prison and his eventual conversion to constitutional politics as a Sinn Fein TD in Dáil Eireann. He ranges widely over his IRA activities and the motivations that drove him in 1984 to organise the Marita Ann attempt to import explosives, arms and ammunition from the United States, for which he was arrested and served ten years in Portlaoise Prison. He talks graphically about his forty-seven days on hunger strike there in protest against conditions and the treatment of political prisoners.
“I accept full responsibility, collective responsibility, for everything the IRA did while I was a member. In conscience you have to be convinced that what you are doing is right even though you wish there was some other way of doing it.”
His daughter Toireasa Ferris, Lecturer in Law in Tralee Community College and Sinn Féin Councillor, whose father was in prison for ten years from the time she was four, says;
“I fully support what my father and others like him did. I totally understand why they did it and I would never stand in judgement over them for it.”
She talks about the impact that growing up in a household where he mother Marie struggled to keep the family together during the years her father was on the run and in prison. Martin Ferris defends his controversial actions earlier this year when he went to meet on their release, IRA prisoners, Pearse Mc Cauley and Kevin Walshe, convicted for the murder of Garda Gerry McCabe.
Father and daughter talk about the current strengths and weakness of the Sinn Féin Party and reaffirm their passionate belief in the possibility of a United Ireland.
Tune in this Sunday morning to Miriam Meets…. on RTÉ Radio 1 at 10.00am
Website: www.rte.ie/radio1/miriammeets
Date: 13 November 2009
Issued by RTÉ Radio
For further information please contact: Sandra Byrne, RTÉ Radio Press and Publicity Office, 01- 208 2506/087- 249 3048, sandra.byrne@rte.ie