PAT CULLEN: KER-POW! (Number three)

This is developing into a pattern. There we are,  walking along hands in pockets, whistling, thinking of next-to-nothing, when KER-POW! – out of nowhere comes a political event that leaves us winded, even stunned.

The Irish public has experienced three of these KER-POWs in recent weeks.

First there was Leo Varadkar. People are thinking about eating fish and chips, or scratching their left ear, or taking up tap-dancing,  when KER-POW!  Leo Varadkar approaches a microphone and says he’s had it with being Taoiseach, let somebody else try their hand, he was outa here.

Then there was the KER-POW! news that  the leader of the DUP, Jeffrey Donaldson, was stepping down as leader and was being questioned about sexual abuse charges. If you saw that one coming you were more of a psychic than a political wise man/woman.

And now, as we check out the TV schedules to see when will the big political debates be on and didn’t Sunak look positively shrunk after that talk delivered in Drowning Street, when KER-POW! – Sinn Féin announces that their candidate for Fermanagh-South Tyrone will be Pat Cullen.

EH?  You heard me. Yes, the Pat Cullen who was General Secretary and Chief Executive of the Royal College  of Nursing. The Pat Cullen who was the RCN spokesperson during their first-ever strike. The Pat Cullen who was listed as No. 15 on the list of powerful left-wing figures of the year, ahead of a lot of supposedly left-wing politicians. The Pat Cullen from Carrickmore.

This is KER-POW! No. 3 because, as with Leo and Jeffrey, it came out of nowhere. Will it help Sinn Féin keep the Fermanagh/South Tyrone  seat? You bet. Beyond her refusal to doff her cap to anyone, her determination to get her way, Pat Cullen  is simply a strong, articulate candidate who has proved her mettle to everyone in Britain, let alone Ireland.

Besides encouraging people to vote for her because of her role as spokeswoman for the Royal College of Nursing (oh how that ‘Royal’ bit must ache in unionist quarters), Pat Cullen will have a wider impact.

Let me tell you a little story. In the days when I was an Irish News columnist, I remember having a dispute with a senior republican about the importance of column-writing. I made what I considered the clinching-point, that I had never written a column which had persuaded anyone to abandon their position on an issue and become converted to my point of view. The prominent republican said yes, it might not change people in their perception of an issue, but it did have the important role in affirming people in their views – pulling together ideas or sentiments which they had in a vague way but never quite clarified for themselves.

I see Pat Cullen as being extremely important in the same way. There you were, thinking that only slightly unhinged lefties were drawn to Sinn Féin; and now here’s her, middle class, leading the Royal College of Nursing, admired on all sides – and it turns out she sees Ireland from a seriously republican stance.

That kind of me-too moment can have a wide impact. There’ll be people who were sorta republican but not quite sure,  half in agreement with the need to win Fermanagh/South Tyrone but also more than a bit iffy about supporting Shinners, after all, weren’t they a bit, well, uncouth, look at the way Gerry Adams talks Irish, all that stuff. But now here comes little Pat, the essence of respectability, and she doesn’t care, she’s happy for the world to know that she’s a republican and she is fully supportive of the need for Sinn Féin to win this seat and at some point hold that promised border poll.

Short of Gavin Robinson being struck and crisped by a thunderbolt, the DUP must be feeling very, very sorry for themselves right now. (Yes, Virginia, your punching the air and shouting “Yeee-hah!” is perfectly permissible at this significant moment.)