Irishman Of Destiny

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31077, 4 June 1966, Page 17

Irishman Of Destiny

(N.Z.P.A.-Reuter—Copyright) DUBLIN, June 3. Eamon De Valera, last night re-elected President of Ireland, rose from the ranks of revolutionaries to become the Republic’s man of destiny.

The 84-year-old traditionalist has dominated the nation’s politics for 50 years. He carved a new Ireland from the chaos of the 1916 Easter Uprising, which led to the overthrow of 300 years of British rule. Because of his American birth—he was born in New York of a Spanish immigrant father and an Irish mother—he was the only one’ of the captured leaders of the revolt to escape banging. He was sentenced to life imprisonment and later escaped from prison in England.

Tall, thin and with failing eyesight, he has become a father figure to the 1,700,000 Irish voters who returned him to power for another seven years. His supporters called him the “uncrowned king of Ireland” during the civil war which swept the newly-inde-

pendent state in 1922 when he led republican rebels against the Irish Government. Later he formed Ireland’s biggest political party the ruling Fianna Fail (Soldiers of Destiny). The "Conservative revolutionary” was Prime Minister of his country for 30 years before accepting the Presidency in 1959, with an election majority of 120,576. Mr De Valera, father of seven children, has made one of his main political aims a united Ireland including the six northern counties which are still under British rule.

During the Second World War, after Ireland had proclaimed its neutrality, he said the country would never fight for Britain while British troops “occupied" the north against the will of most Irish people. His latest call for unity was at 50th anniversary celebrations of the Easter Rising in

Dublin a few months ago while 15,000 police in the northern capital of Belfast stood by to resist violence from the republican extremists.

He has also fought for the restoration of Gaelic, formerly banned by the British, as the national language.

Radiation Tests. Rain catchment tanks are being placed around Melbourne to test any radiation in the air caused by the French nuclear tests in the South Pacific. Melbourne, June 3.