Political mortar attack designed to distract us from the real blood

Paul Williams Email

November 07 2013 02:04 AM

Sinn Fein yesterday mounted what is being viewed as a desperate operation to launch the political equivalent of a good old mortar bomb attack when Pearse Doherty declared that he had obtained more Anglo Tapes.

The Republican crusader demonstrated the seriousness of what he had uncovered by popping up to hand-deliver tapes to garda HQ and the Central Bank.

And then he revealed that based on legal advice, Sinn Fein could not publish the contents of the tapes.

Pearse and his comrades will publish the contents "as soon as possible", but how soon the old spoil sport wouldn't say.

And then, after much grandstanding, the Shinners strategically retreated from the battle field hoping that they had suitably distracted the public from other more distressing matters.

Sinn Fein's great Anglo Tape expose is being seen, however, as a phoney publicity stunt designed to distract from the blood-soaked scandals piling up around his party fuehrer, Gerry Adams.

Doherty's almost hysterical disclosure about obtaining the tapes is a classic Sinn Fein smokescreen.

He threw a bone and, predictably, some of the inhabitants of our media world chewed on it gratefully.

As the journalist who broke the Anglo Tapes story I have listened to countless hours of telephone conversations recorded in the bank between 2007 and 2009. Unlike Sinn Fein, the Irish Independent published the astounding material from the tapes in the public interest last summer.

There is plenty of evidence of the hubris and recklessness that drove this country into poverty.

In particular, Doherty's reference – or veiled threat – to Fianna Fail in connection with the tapes in his possession reinforces the view that this is a cynical political ploy.

The recorded conversations took place on the phone of Anglo's head of treasury John Bowe, who by now has earned his spot in history as the man who pulled a €7bn bailout figure out of his well-padded posterior.

He had no conversations with members of Fianna Fail so Michael Martin and his colleagues, who still carry much blame for our economic woes, really don't have to worry about Pearse's insinuations.

Sinn Fein is likely to have received these tapes many months ago but were holding them in their public relations arsenal for an emergency.

And that urgency came on Monday night in the joint RTE/BBC investigation, 'The Disappeared', which clearly pointed to the fact that innocent people were abducted, murdered and dumped in unmarked graves on the orders of IRA godfather, Gerry Adams.

In particular, the programme focused on the utterly horrific kidnapping of a widow and mother of 10 little children, Jean McConville.

The ghost of Adams's once most trusted comrade, Brendan 'The Dark' Hughes, came back to haunt him when he told the Irish public that the man who gave the order for that outrage "is now the head of Sinn Fein".

But the former Provo boss – the only man still protesting he was NOT a terrorist – denied everything and accused his brother in arms of being a liar.

Everyone who questions the murky past of Adams or Sinn Fein/IRA is a liar or misguided. Gerry reminds us too that he is the saint of the peace process, implying that his sins be forgotten.

The party leader and his comrades have been squatting on the high moral ground of our Dail since the 2011 election.

They pontificate and question the morality and truthfulness of those sitting around them in Leinster House at every opportunity.

Like the emperor and his lovely new clothes, Adams never misses a chance to parade his holier-than-thou wisdom while ignoring the murders, the maiming, the drug deals, the bank robberies and the child abuse.

Pearse Doherty and Mary Lou McDonald and the rest of the comrades prefer to lecture everyone else, while refusing to confront their leader's hypocrisy and lies.

Perhaps the objective of Pearse Doherty's surprise attack was also intended to make us forget about the simmering scandal of Gerry Adams's attempts to cover up the truth about his paedophile brother Liam.

Despite the damning testimony of the victim, Liam's daughter Aine Dahlstrom, her mother and uncle, about Gerry Adams' role in the cover-up he has managed to swat away awkward questions.

No doubt the Anglo tapes are now as valuable to Mr Adams as his fellow travellers' once treasured arsenals of Ak 47s and Semtex explosives.