"Bloody well get on and do it, otherwise I'll head-butt you!"
"Bloody well get on and do it, otherwise I'll head-butt you!" overheard talking to Sinn Fein's Gerry Adams at talks running up to the Good Friday Agreement. Mo Mowlem who died 19 August 2005So we loose another great politician of our time. One of the unsung heroes on Modern Day politics yet someone who achieved so much. She was the leading figure in the Good Friday Agreement, she stood up for what she thought and believed. She, like Robin Cook who died earlier this month, stood up against the Iraq war stating publicly that "I don't think it was right and I don't think it was legal but I don't have enough legal knowledge to be 100% sure of the latter,".
Tony Blair described her as "a natural politician, could read a situation and analyse and assess it as fast as anyone". but Mo was more than a politician, she told it how it was, whether you liked it or not. She wasn't afraid to put herself up to be shot down and not just in the political arena but also in the media. She was like able, love able and she grew into you. Despite her illness she came back, she carried on when others would have failed. She fought and seemed to be getting over things despite the years of her brain tumour, but in the end the treatment, or a reaction to the treatment causing her to loose her balance and fall never to regain consciousness lead to her end. But one thing is certain there will never be another Mo Mowlem and the world will be a sadder place for it. She wore her heart and herself on her sleeve and what you saw was what you got, something that a lot of politicians lack.
She wasn't afraid to say when something was wrong, she wasn't afraid to talk to all elements to decide the best way forward, as he visit to the Maze prison showed whilst she was Secretary for Northern Ireland. "I didn't negotiate, I didn't do a deal. If you want progress, you ain't going to get it if you don't have talks," on going inside the Maze prison to meet Loyalists in a bid to restart the peace process. She would talk to everyone to figure out the correct position and as she stated herself, "Everyone has got to give a little. No-one is going to get 100% of what they want. If everybody is willing to accept some change, we can do it," urging a spirit of compromise on the eve of the Good Friday agreement in 1998.
She will be missed.
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