Meet Michelle O’Neill
Photos courtesy of Sinn Fein
To those of you who follow politics on the island of Ireland, no introduction is necessary for the woman who holds the top job in the Six Counties. Michelle O’Neill is the First Minister of Northern Ireland. That a Catholic woman who is also vice president of Sinn Fein should hold a post so high in the British hierarchy would have been unimaginable when she was born Michele Doris in Fermoy, County Cork in 1977.
Michelle O’Neill is coming to the west coast
On the evening of June 5, Northern Ireland First Minister O’Neill will speak at the United Irish Cultural Center on the southwestern rim of San Francisco. When the people of Ireland were polled, she got the highest approval rating of any office holder in the Republic of Ireland or Northern Ireland, which makes her the most popular politician in the Irish nation.
O’Neill is coming all this way to talk about one topic: United Ireland.
“On the island of Ireland, we know all too well the effects of Westminster rule (from England) and the legacy of partition and discrimination and oppression. My election as the first nationalist and republican First Minister was never meant to happen,” she wrote in the Irish News earlier this month.
There’s fresh wind in her sails these days when it comes to ending the British role in the Six Counties. Voters in the other two remaining colonies – Scotland and Wales – just elected independence candidates for the top jobs in what’s left of the empire.
She was in London when the results came in. Standing outside Parliament, she added: “We’re here after a weekend of seismic change where, again, you see Scotland on the march, Wales on the march, an increasing realisation that Westminster does not serve the interests of the people – that certainly is the case for Ireland.
“We are living through a time of extraordinary change. We will have: a pro-independence First Minister here in the North of Ireland, a pro-independence First Minister in Scotland and a pro-independence First Minister in Wales.”
Who is Michelle O’Neill and how did she become First Minister of NI?
She was born into the Irish republican tradition. Her father served in the IRA and served time in prison for it. She was an exceptional student at St. Patrick’s Girls’ Academy in Dungannon, Co. Tyrone (one of the Six Counties). But her academic career was interrupted when she had a baby at the age of sixteen. Her supportive parents helped raise the child while she finished school. She and the child’s father (Paddy O’Neill) married and had another child. They separated in 2014. She’s now a proud “granny”.
She followed her father into local politics and rose through the ranks of Sinn Fein to become a trusted aide to Martin McGuiness, who was second in command to Gerry Adams in the party of Irish nationalism. McGuinness stepped aside in 2017 and died within a couple of months. O’Neill took over as vice president of Sinn Fein while navigating a crooked path to leadership in the NI Assembly, called Stormont. Finally, after a lot of politics-as-usual in Belfast, enough Sinn Fein candidates won to elect her First Minister. O'Neill took office on 3 February 2024, as the first Irish nationalist, republican or Catholic to hold that position since partition in 1921.
Who's the other woman?
“Complicated and confusing” are the two words O'Neill uses to describe Six County politics. Nationalists (mostly Catholics) and Unionists (mostly Protestants) have had a hell of a time working out differences that go back centuries. Her position is the product of torturous compromise. She shares executive duties with Deputy First Minister Emma Little-Pengelly (“equal power but less prestige”), who believes NI should remain in what’s left of the British Empire. O’Neill definitely does not. “We come from two different lived experiences, and we have two different outlooks for where we should be in the future. That’s alright, isn’t it?” said O’Neill on RTE’s Late Late Show, an appearance credited with boosting her approval ratings in the Republic.
Hardball at Stormont
O’Neill’s political opponents can be pretty dismissive. From the Guardian:Since entering the public eye as a minister and deputy first minister, O’Neill has had to field comments on her appearance. “The beauty from a family drenched in blood,” the tabloid Daily Mail opined in 2017. “Glossy blonde hair. Bright lipstick. Curled eyelashes. Painted nails. Figure-hugging outfits. Michelle O’Neill certainly isn’t what we expected.”
Leading Unionist Arlene Foster was pressed in an interview to sum up her Sinn Fein colleague in a word. “Blonde,” she said. O’Neill’s response? "There can be no room in our society for sexism, misogyny, racism, homophobia or any form of discrimination. There is no right or wrong way to look and women are in positions of leadership because we belong, representing everyone equally."
The Good Friday Generation rather than Gen X
Bobby Sands once wrote, “Our revenge will be the laughter of our children.” Provisional IRA man Sands died on hunger strike 45 years ago this month. Michelle O’Neill was four years old at the time. She became a volunteer with the political party Sinn Fein right after the Good Friday Agreement was signed in May of 1998. Here’s her best-known answer when asked why she attends the funerals of physical force republicans in the IRA.
"I think at the time there was no alternative. Now, thankfully, we have an alternative to conflict and that's the Good Friday Agreement. My whole adult life has been building the peace process. I wish the conditions were never here that actually led to conflict. The only way we're ever going to build a better future is actually to understand that it's OK to have a different take on the past. My narrative is a very different one to someone who's perhaps lost a loved one at the hands of republicans."
A packed house is expected at the United Irish Cultural Center on June 5. After all, how many chances will we get to hear from the woman who could be the last First Minister of Northern Ireland and/or the first Taoiseach of a United Ireland.
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