The Late J.W. -- Stormont Watch

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Date Posted: Sun, May 06 2007, 21:01:33 PDT
Author: Oration
Subject: The Late J.W.

Eulogy at graveside of Johnny White
Posted on May 3, 2007 at 06:46:15 AM by Sean Mac

The following speech was delivered today at the graveside of former IRA
Officer Commanding and former Adjutant General of the INLA Johnny White.
This eulogy was delivered by Johnny's close friend and comrade Terry
Robson.

------------ --------- --------- ------Tribute

Comrades and friends

We are gathered at this place to mourn the death and to honour and
celebrate the life of our friend and comrade Johnny White.

In celebrating his life, we are expected to say that he lived life to the
full and that we are able to remember the good times as well as the bad.
His family will be left to mourn a man of generosity, of simple pleasures
who was most at ease in the company of his own family and of his friends.
But we also know that Johnny�s life since the death of his wife Maura was
one of sadness and of loneliness. Although he was always comforted by the
closeness of his sons and daughters, the light in his life flickered and
never really recovered since the death of Moria.

But as many of you who stood at this same spot some three years ago will
remember and who observed the effect on Johnny of the deep tragedy of
Moria�s death and the pain that was evident in his face, there was also a
realization that we were probably witnessing the beginning of the end of
Johnny�s life as well.

There is a deep irony in claiming to be wise after the event, but there
were those of us who knew him well who quietly looked at each other and
understood instinctively that the man mourning the death of his wife was
confronted by a deep and painful agony with which he was to grapple from
then until now.

But just as it is important to express and make clear the hurt of this
loss suffered by all of us and especially by his family, it is also
important to make clear that Johnny White was no ordinary man and that in
our individual and collective grief we should be able to record for
posterity, our admiration for his intellect, our respect for his political
commitment and our gratitude for his loyalty and devotion to his friends
and comrades.

This connection with Johnny goes back a long way and in my case for almost
forty years. During the heat of political debate and in the confrontations
of street conflict, it was Johnny White who made it clear to me and to
others that what was taking place in the struggle for civil rights in the
North was both a struggle for national self-determination and a struggle
for the freedom of the Irish working-class.

To those of us in our confused and undeveloped way who believed
instinctively that we were involved in a class struggle, it was to Johnny
and others who introduced us to the socialist republicanism of James
Connolly and who made it clear that the national question and the class
struggle were one and the same � not just two sides of the same coin � not
separate, but related and everlasting. It was a view which he held for all
of his adult life.

It was the simplicity of the message we received in those early days when
we all felt that we were riding on the crest of a revolutionary wave in
which fundamental political change seemed inevitable, which made Johnny so
unique, so uncluttered, so reasoned and so consistent.

For him, society consisted of two great opposing classes and that the
class interests of the minority were used to deny the class interests of
the majority. This led him to declare in the tradition of Connolly his
unapologetic support for the Irish working class and his hatred of bigotry
racism, sexism and sectarianism. In so many ways this uncomplicated
approach to politics was the mark of the man which set him aside from
others and which demonstrated his talent and ability for leadership at
critical periods in our history.

Johnny White had a long and distinguished involvement as a republican
fighter. But for those who still believe that Irish Republicanism is
confined to the expulsion of the British presence and that the struggle
for working class emancipation is a distraction, let it be said that
Johnny White represented a broader political consciousness, characterized
by an internationalist perspective in which a rejection of exclusivity, of
bigotry and of sectarianism would have been at the core of his political
consciousness. He would have supported the tactic engaging in electoral
politics, but he would never have agreed to an alliance with unionism.
Johnny never wavered from this view He was for all of us a perfect example
of the disciplined professional revolutionary.

Such a distinguished political involvement brought him through the ranks
of the republican movement; as a member of the IRA army council and to act
as Officer Commanding the Derry Command, Official Irish Republican Army
during the most critical periods following the erection of the barricades
in 19769 and in 1971 and in response to the widespread use of internment
powers by the Unionist administration Johnny took part in several
engagements against the forces of occupation.

But as important and significant as that particular role may have been, it
needs to be remembered that Johnny White was also central to many of the
political initiatives which led finally to the collapse of the Stormont
regime during his chairmanship of the James Connolly Republican Club.

He was a founder member of the Derry Citizens� Defence Committee,
established as a peoples� response within Free Derry to the uniformed
invaders of the RUC and B Specials and acted in defence of those
barricaded areas.

He was active in the formation of the Derry Housing Action Committee which
highlighted the abuse of the landlord system and the sectarian
mismanagement of local housing provision.

He took part in the many demonstrations of the Unemployed Action
Committee, formed to highlight the problem of enforced emigration and
long-term unemployment.

During all of this period whilst he continued to support the non-sectarian
programme of the Civil Rights movement he argued forcefully for a class
analysis of the situation in the North whilst forming alliances with other
like-minded radical groups such as the Derry Labour Party, Derry Young
Socialists and the Peoples� Democracy, fore runners of the
anti-imperialist broad front strategy.

After being forced over the border because of his leadership role as the
most senior Official IRA man in Derry, Johnny and his family continued to
lead a life of permanent and perpetual harassment by the Garda Special
Branch as they moved from Buncrana to Letterkenny and then to Dublin.

It was during this time when, in exposing the duplicity and hypocrisy of
the Goulding-led leadership of the Official IRA, he joined with Seamus
Costello and others in the formation of the Irish Republican Socialist
Party serving for a time on its first national executive. The leadership
of Costello and Johnnie White also resulted in the coming together of
former IRA volunteers in a new revolutionary armed initiative, the Irish
National Liberation Army, in which Johnnie served as its first Adjutant
General.

It was also during this period that he and Costello were praised for their
contribution during a conference in Amherst in the United States when they
vigorously debated the political programme of socialist republicanism with
representatives of unionism and loyalism.

But these were difficult times in the movement and the debates which took
place within the IRSP in those early days on what he saw as the dominant
role of the army in the democratic process led Johnny once again to move
with others in the creation of the short-lived Irish Committee for a
Socialist Programme and the Irish Socialist Party. It was a move which
Johnnie was to deeply regret whilst for the fledgling IRSP it meant the
loss of one of its most able organisers.

Since then he returned to Derry, involved himself in community work, acted
as a welfare rights adviser, becoming active once again in trade union
work.

His decision to give evidence at the Bloody Sunday tribunal with other
former members of his IRA staff was to be no narrow contribution to a
British established inquiry. On the contrary, Johnnie saw it as an
opportunity to set the record straight � to confirm the defensive role of
the IRA on that day, to expose the dishonesty of the British government
and to reject the duplicity and hypocrisy of former priests that the
�Officials� were driven by an alien ideology and tainted with accusations
of criminality.

Let there be no mistake, to the end Johnny White was a man of principle
whose primary aim was the creation of a party of the Irish working class.
To many of us he was one of the real heroes of the struggle for freedom
and democracy in Ireland. The fact that he suffered pain and loss in later
years merely confirms a real sense of humanity of the man. He was one of
us and we shall always remember him for his contribution, for his
commitment and for his comradeship

To those of his family, his daughters Patricia, Roisin, and Maria, sons
Sean, Kieran, Liam and grandchildren, his brothers Tommy, Willie and Bobby
and sisters Tillie and Kathleen, who have lost a father, a grandfather and
a brother we extend our deepest sympathy.

We have lost many comrades in the past and we loved all of them. But this
one was special and we loved him because of who he was and, especially,
because he was one of us.

Finally, let me use the words of a another revolutionary on the death of
Malcolm X, the champion of black liberation and socialism recalled by
Bernadette McAliskey on the death of Johnnie�s friend and comrade, Seamus
Costello:

"Without Johnny, we feel suddenly vulnerable, small and weak, somewhat
frightened, not by the prospect of death, but of life and struggle without
his contribution, his strength and inspiration. "

Thank you.

Replies:

RUC harrassment at the funeral - By Sean Mac May 3, 2007 at 06:48:12 AM
Man freed in funeral shots probe - By Sean Mac May 3, 2007 at 06:49:34 AM
The Late J.W. - By BOGSIDER May 6, 2007 at 01:46:28 PM
Re(1): The Late J.W. - By Letter to Derry paper May 6, 2007 at 01:54:28 PM
Re(2): The Late J.W. - By Press Conference quotes May 6, 2007 at 02:05:51 PM
Re(3): The Late J.W. - By Sunday Journal (Derry) May 6, 2007 at 02:09:34 PM

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