Re. the SDLP man deciding to withdraw his nomination, my speculation is as valid as yours, and more than plausible.

Its still only speculation and completely in keeping with your bias and as it happens completely untrue. I tend to rely on the facts. You see the difference between you and I Keith is that, as far as I know you have never set foot in N.I. I on the other hand lived through the period in question every hour of every day. Now back to the point you made about the SDLP rep. withdrawing his nomination because he feared for his life and the lives of his family. The particular seat that Bobby Sands took was MP for Fermanagh- South Tyrone. The incumbent was a man by the name of Frank Maguire who past away after a lenghty illness.

There was infighting amongst the SDLP party as to who would replace Mr Maguire. The party's support was split between two candidates, Austin Currie and Frank McGuire's brother Noel. Who by all accounts was a fairly inexperienced politician. Currie had stood in 1979 against Unionist leader Harry West without the endorsement of the party and lost the election. Currie's self serving attitude in 1979 forced the party leadership to temporarily remove him from his executive position, though he was by 1981 reinstated. It was the fear of being ostracised for good, should he repeat that performance that forced Currie to swallow a bitter pill, when the party executive decided to overturn the local selection convention and not to contest the election.

Step up Noel McGuire and Fr Joe McVeigh. I'll leave Father McVeigh to end the "speculation" in his own words.

"Shortly after hearing about the second hunger strike, I opened the New York Times and read about the sudden death of Frank Maguire, MP for Fermanagh- South Tyrone. His death came as a great shock to me. We had been very close friends. I did not realise he had been so ill.

Not too long after his funeral, I heard a report that there was a move to enter Bobby Sands in the by-election against the unionist candidate, Harry West. I thought this was a brilliant idea. There were other nationalist candidates going forward but I knew that for Bobby to have a chance there had to be a straight fight with West. All that was required was for the SDLP to withdraw and for Noel Maguire, a brother of Frank, to withdraw and support the Sands campaign.

When I got confirmation that Bobby Sands was entering the election I phoned Noel Maguire and said that I thought he should consider making way for him. Noel took his own counsel and eventually decided to withdraw from the contest leaving a straight fight between Bobby Sands and Harry West.

There was a solid republican vote in this constituency. There was hope that Bobby Sands would win the election, bringing world attention to his situation and the intolerable conditions in Long Kesh prison and the British government would be forced to come to a deal."

From the Irish Democrat.