When I sat down with Gerry Adams for an interview almost 15 years ago, I knew whatever he said would be well read.
But I had no idea it would spark a dark public confession from one reader sitting in her Dublin home seething with fury at his words.
In the hit Disney+ series Say Nothing, there’s a nod to that catalyst for former IRA member Dolours Price as she is shown reading a newspaper with a front page picture of Adams.
Read more: Noel Doran: I will not easily forget my telephone calls with Dolours Price
Like anyone involved in the events depicted in the programme, it brought me back in time: to sitting opposite Adams on a tiny coffee table couch at his large office in Stormont’s Parliament Buildings.
It had been some time since the Irish News had been given the opportunity for a one-on-one with the then-Sinn Féin president.
Surrounded by a small coterie of advisers, this controversial giant of Irish politics greeted me in his office, offered me a coffee and insisted he make it himself.
There was a lot to ask him: it was not long after the Hillsborough Agreement allowed policing and justice powers to be devolved to Stormont. There were long-running issues around Orange Order parades and thorny questions about alleged child abuse within Sinn Féin.
Adams began the interview with generous answers, particularly over current political questions but as I began to delve into the past, the answers shortened and he became terse.
As we veered towards the topic of the IRA’s practice of ‘disappearing’ republicans, his answers whittled down to one word.
Were you a member of the IRA at the time of Jean McConville’s murder? Were you aware that she was to be murdered and her body dumped? Did you ever agree with the practice of disappearing people?
All met with the same single answer reply: “No.”
And then we turned to the topic of Joe Lynskey. It was my first opportunity to ask Adams about the former monk and IRA member who had only that year been revealed to have been one of the Disappeared.
Strangely, Adams’s answers lengthened.
He revealed that he knew Lynskey – they were neighbours who lived across the street from one another.
“I knew him and he disappeared,” Adams told me. “There were numerous rumours over the last 40 years that he was sighted in Birmingham, Manchester and Australia – obviously anyone with information should come forward.”
He characterised what had happened to Lynskey as “a very sad story” and one that was “very difficult for his family”.
“My thoughts are with the family and if the report was accurate, the circumstances of him being taken and court-martialled by the IRA are very sad for his family.”
We moved on to other subjects including the future of his leadership, which allowed him to neatly refer to the coffee he had made me earlier and how he was as happy “making coffee in this room or... as party leadership”.
I certainly didn’t expect a phone call the next day from a shaken Dolours Price, furious about what she had read from Adams in The Irish News
Adams never made a move without calculating the consequences.
But I wonder did he consider what moves his comments about Lynskey might spark.
I certainly didn’t expect a phone call the next day from a shaken Dolours Price, furious about what she had read from Adams in The Irish News.
She was so enraged that she was ready to confess her involvement in the IRA’s practice of abducting, murdering and secretly burying republicans. She accused Adams of being her ‘officer commanding’ at the time.
My former colleague Allison Morris, who interviewed Price, and editor Noel Doran have eloquently described their role in what happened next.
Read more: Horrendous, cruel, hurtful: Say Nothing portrayal of Jean McConville not ‘entertainment’ says son
Price became the most senior republican to admit to her role and to give information on what she knew about the Disappeared. One of her first confessions was how she drove Lynskey across the border in 1972 towards his death.
Her story would ultimately become a Disney+ series, introducing a new generation to the harrowing reality of the Disappeared.
If a week is a long time in politics, 14 years is a lifetime.
I’ve moved away from Northern Ireland and Adams has since stepped aside from leadership.
But he remains dogged by some of the very same questions I put to him in that interview.
Were you a member of the IRA? Did you agree with the practice of disappearing people?
A former Irish News political correspondent, Diana Cacciottolo is now news editor of The Times of Malta
