THE 16 men who walked from Bantry to Dublin 60 years ago to campaign for better rights for farmers were remembered at a special commemoration in Bantry last Saturday.
IFA President Francie Gorman addressed a crowd of approximately 500 who gathered in the square from where the National Farmers Association’s President Rickard Deasy and 16 local farmers set off on foot on October 7 1966.
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They completed the 217-mile journey on foot and 30,000 farmers joined them along the way, before they converged on Dublin. A three- week sit in on the steps of Government buildings by nine farmers last three weeks before the Government agree to meet NFA and discuss their demands.
Five of those men who marched from Bantry in 1966 – Michael Keohane, Jim Morris, Jackie O’Sullivan, Johnny O’Sullivan and Tom Mullins – attended Saturday’s special commemoration.
Francie Gorman said that the Farmers’ Rights Campaign was a seminal event in the history of NFA/IFA.
‘The right to negotiate, which we fought for 60 years ago, is an important today as it was in 1966. Those who answered the call are owed a huge debt of gratitude from farmers.”
He added that the Campaign of 1966 was the single most important event in the history of NFA/IFA was defined by the determination, commitment and perseverance of a group of people for the betterment of farm families.
The aim of the campaign was to advance the Declaration of Farmers’ Rights and was based on the style of Martin Luther King, the American civil rights campaigner and drew inspiration from the famous March on Washington in 1964.
The Declaration reminded the Government of the day of the Proclamation of 1916 and in particular that the Republic guaranteed ‘equal rights and equal opportunities to all its citizens.’ It called on the Government to honour the promises of 1916 and proclaim and declare 11 basic rights of the rural and farm families of Ireland.
“This commemoration was about honouring those who marched in ’66. Their sacrifice and commitment to the cause must never be forgotten. Without them, we in NFA and IFA could not have achieved so much on behalf of farm families in the decades since.”
