Ardoyne is in mourning for veteran republican and committed Gael Gerard McGuigan who passed away earlier today (Friday)

Gerard represented the people of Ardoyne in City Hall in the mid-eighties and nineties when Sinn Féin councillors ran a gauntlet of unionist opposition which included being barred from speaking at meetings or attending civic functions. Elected first as one of seven Sinn Féin councillors in 1985, he was 'welcomed' to the Council chamber by Sammy Wilson who assailed "the evil human pus who are part of the Republic's poison in the city".

"STEADFAST": Gerard McGuigan joining fellow-Sinn Féin representatives at a picket of PPS offices in 2007
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"STEADFAST": Gerard McGuigan joining fellow-Sinn Féin representatives at a picket of PPS offices in 2007

Gerard went on to represent North Belfast in a series of City Hall committees and played a full role in the transformation of the Council into an open and democratic forum for all as the political situation transformed post-ceasefires.

A life-long member of Ard Eoin GAC, he was also a driving force behind the Ard Eoin Fleadh and contributed to the setting up of the first naíscoil in Ardoyne in the eighties.

In the riotous 'brawl in the hall' in July 1988 – when unionist and nationalist councillors engaged in fisticuffs in the chamber — he was famously accused of raising a chair above his head, forcing a swift retreat of his more numerous unionist adversaries. 

The McGuigan house was attacked twice by loyalists. Fortunately, he was in bed when a grenade was thrown into his living room and, on a separate occasion, in his kitchen sipping tea when shots were fired into the living room. 

COUNTING THEM IN: Margaret Adams, the late Siobhán O'Hanlon and Gerard McGuigan at a 2003 election count.
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COUNTING THEM IN: Margaret Adams, the late Siobhán O'Hanlon and Gerard McGuigan at a 2003 election count.

Though he suffered a stroke and suffered failing health in recent years, Gerard kept active to the end and was on the street during every confrontation during the Orange march stand-offs.

In 2015, he took part in an RTÉ documentary about the altar boys of Holy Cross in 1969 and how their lives turned out. 

North Belfast MLA Gerry Kelly paid tribute to the former councillor's "perseverance and loyalty". "He and Bobby Lavery were the first two Sinn Féin councillors from North Belfast at a time when it was very dangerous to be a republican elected representative," he told belfastmedia.com. "He led from the front and won the admiration of republicans not just in North Belfast but right across the city for his steadfast and committed stand. He was a faithful activist right throughout his life and right up until he breathed his last."

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