Delivering democracy at the height of the Troubles: Former Northern Ireland vote chief Pat Bradley publishes tell-all memoir & More News Here

A brand new memoir from Northern Ireland’s former election chief recollects the challenges of delivering democracy throughout the darkest days of the Troubles.

n Ballots, Bombs and Bullets, Pat Bradley writes of the second that he introduced the end result of the Good Friday Agreement referendum in 1998 and the election of IRA starvation striker Bobby Sands in 1981.

He was appointed deputy electoral officer in 1974, beginning out in Londonderry, his hometown.

Pat discovered himself thrown in at the deep finish with little expertise and with a backdrop of paramilitary opposition to the electoral course of.

The 1974 basic election was the first of many polls he would oversee in a profession that noticed him turn out to be a revered professional round the world.

He was appointed chief electoral officer in 1980 and was primarily based in Belfast when Bobby Sands was elected.

“At that time, Sinn Fein and the IRA were very anti-system, but they had decided to publicise the hunger strike by getting Bobby Sands to stand for election,” Mr Bradley mentioned.

With Sinn Fein narrowly beating the UUP to win the Fermanagh and South Tyrone seat, Mr Bradley mentioned it marked a turning level for the get together.

“It swung them around from being totally militaristic to having the inclusion of elections, a way to publicise their objectives,” he added.

“That was a very important swing because if that hadn’t happened, the Provos would never have moved towards elections and God knows what would have happened.”

Mr Bradley’s most well-known second got here in 1998, when he introduced the end result of the Good Friday Agreement referendum at the King’s Hall in Belfast.

He described it as the peak of his profession, regardless of having labored in elections round the world.

“What actually happened is that I ran the referendum as an independent officer, and the parties did not have the control they normally have over other elections,” Mr Bradley mentioned.

“Despite that, they accepted I had run the referendum pretty and precisely.

“When I made the announcement, I realised it was a historic second as a result of what you discovered was that on the nationalist aspect you had a majority.

“Within the unionist aspect, you had a divide. The events didn’t have a united entrance, which weakened their place.

“When I announced the result to the public — to the world, in fact — and nobody raised a single query, that was something that I was very proud of.”

His later profession noticed his experience wanted by worldwide organisations comparable to the UN and the EU of their makes an attempt to introduce or improve democracy in areas of battle.

Before retiring as chief electoral officer in 2000, he labored as a technical adviser in additional than 30 nations, together with Russia, Sierra Leone, Saudi Arabia and South Africa.

With the Assembly in turmoil but once more after the newest election, Mr Bradley mentioned his expertise had taught him that nations with a lot better issues had discovered a method ahead.

“The problems in Northern Ireland are small and insignificant in comparison to other countries in which I’ve worked, like Kosovo and Bosnia Herzegovina,” he added.

“I say to myself, ‘It’s about time in Northern Ireland that we caught ourselves on’. What I wished to do with the guide was to indicate that nations which might be worse off in relationships to one another survived and bought going correctly.

“Why can’t we do the identical in Belfast, Derry and Northern Ireland as an entire?

“My favourite expression for the present times is that it’s time we started building bridges and stop digging trenches.”

Ballots, Bombs and Bullets will be purchased on-line by www.etsy.com. It can also be out there in Belfast from the No Alibis bookshop on Botanic Avenue, and in Derry at Little Acorns Bookstore on Foyle Street and Foyle Books in Craft Village

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