AS chair of the SDLP's Lurgan branch I first got to know Seamus Mallon when he represented the former Armagh constituency in the new power sharing assembly of 1973. Subsequently during the three decades until his retirement in 2001, as a representative of the Upper Bann constituency and as minister of agriculture I was privileged to work with and get to know a man of formidable strength of character, courage and tenacity.
Seamus was a conviction politician driven by a passionate commitment to the hard slog of progress through politics to deliver a new north and a new Ireland based on the principles of equality, justice and real partnership. As John Hume put it, he believed in spilling sweat, not blood.
For those who never experienced the horrendous years of the 1970s and '80s, during which the worst of the atrocities were committed by the UVF, UDA, IRA and state forces, it is difficult if not impossible to appreciate the enormous challenges he faced. Opposed to violence from all sides, as SDLP spokesperson on justice and policing he spoke out fearlessly against all of it.
Living in the unionist area of Markethill and cheek by jowl with south Armagh where the IRA operated, it has to be said, against the wishes of the majority of that community, he was misunderstood at best and at worst more often publicly abused, even threatened from all sides, unionist, loyalist and republican. It was a harrowing time for him, his equally brave late wife, Gertrude and young daughter, Orla. They lived in the murder triangle and he was a target. He never wavered.
Having resigned his teaching job when elected to the short lived power sharing Assembly in 1973 and the Northern Ireland Convention in 1975/76, he nevertheless committed himself to constitutional politics for a further frustrating ten years of political vacuum until his election as an MP in 1986. He spoke for the majority of nationalists during those terrible years reflecting his and their total opposition to all violence and particularly that which purported to be carried out in their name. Many of those who did not live through those years may not realise how much he and his family sacrificed in order to give true leadership and hope in times of deep despair.
Seamus is well known among his friends to enjoy a game of poker and he certainly brought his expertise at that game to the negotiating table in the endless rounds of talks that eventually led to the Good Friday Agreement. He was a shrewd and fearless negotiator. His skills were tested many times, as was his patience when he and his party colleagues were aware that the British government was holding separate discussions with Sinn Féin and with unionists to which the SDLP representing the majority of the nationalist community were not privy.
As deputy first minister in the assembly in 1998 he again showed a determination to make the institutions work. It was never going to be easy. Seamus Mallon and David Trimble were two very different personalities. Could I imagine David Trimble performing Seamus’s party pieces – The Bard of Armagh or My Laughing Boy – any more than Seamus relaxing by sitting through La Traviata or Madame Butterfly? They represented communities bitterly divided by history and by years of atrocities visited on each side by the “other”.
Despite this I know they were both committed to making it work.
Ironically it was the continued failure of the republican movement to deliver decommissioning that totally undermined David Trimble’s authority within the unionist community, played into the hands of the DUP and led to the collapse of the executive.
Seamus has been bitterly disappointed by the absolute failure of DUP and Sinn Féin to live up to the principles of the Good Friday Agreement. I know however, having spoken to him recently that he is buoyed by the emergence in Northern Ireland of a new generation supporting those very principles and being led by a new generation of SDLP under the committed and articulate leadership of Colum Eastwood , Nichola Mallon and Claire Hanna.
*Brid Rodgers is a founding member of the SDLP, a member of the party's Good Friday Agreement talks team, an Assembly Member for Upper Bann and Minister for Agriculture from 1999 to 2002.
