The first time I remember meeting Donncha Ó hÉallaithe was when I was in my early twenties. I was driving my mother’s car out to Indreabhán and ended up giving him a lift — or a síob as they call it in Cois Fharraige.       We spoke in Irish. I’d been brought up with it in the city and I was doing Irish in college and so my Irish was good, but it was no match for the lovely blas that Donncha — a Tipperary native — had.

I left him off around na hAille about a kilometre short of Teach Mór where I was going. I had the dog, an overactive Jack Russell, with me in the car and when Donncha jumped out, so did the dog and scarpered up the road. I did not notice it.

“Tá an gadhair tar éis éalú,” he said.

“Céard?”

“An gadhair. Léim sé amach ón gcarr.”

It was then that I realised there was another word for ‘madra’ in the Irish language. And it was then I made a mental note to myself. “Must do Better”.

I don’t particularly want to single out Donncha Ó hÉallaithe, but that’s what I am doing. He is only one of many gaiscí who have campaigned non-stop for the rights of the Gaeltacht regions and its people, and have obdurately fought to keep the Irish language alive as a first language in these tiny area.

Before I had even met him, and that was probably in the late 1980s, I had known of Ó hÉallaithe as an activist. Nearly four decades later, he is still fighting the good fight, ar son na cúise.

Last Christmas, he sent me a copy of a petition that had been sent to then-Taoiseach Simon Harris, outlining why a new group called Bánú (desertion would be an approximation in English) had been formed.

Efforts to ‘save’ the Gaeltachts have been ongoing since the foundation of the State.

My father, a Donegal native, was involved in one such venture. He worked for the Department of Agriculture and was in charge, in Conamara, of a scheme that incentivised families living on marginal land to build glass houses and grow tomatoes.

The scheme lasted for 30 years — and worked very well for a while — but ultimately was defeated by cheap imports from Holland.

Udarás na Gaeltachta and its predecessor Gaeltarra Éireann have been in existence since 1957, trying to foster employment opportunities in the Gaeltacht, and have certainly helped to stem the tide (which nevertheless continues to ebb).

Bánú’s aim is to address a housing crisis in the Gaeltacht areas and to advocate for solutions to ease the problem.

Caption: Donncha Ó hÉallaithe.

Read Harry’s column in full in this week’s Connacht Tribune, on sale in shops now, or you can download the digital edition from www.connachttribune.ie. You can also download our Connacht Tribune App from Apple’s App Store or get the Android Version from Google Play.