Inside the home life of Taoiseach Michael Martin with his wife and children in Cork

MICHEAL Martin took office as Ireland’s Taoiseach in June 2020 – but has worked in Irish politics since 1985.

Party leader Fianna Fail and father are from Co Cork and have worked as a teacher, a city council member, Lord Mayor of Cork and a TD in Dail Eireann.

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Martin has served as Taoiseach for much of the Covid-19 pandemic and is expected to hand over his post to Fine Gael frontman Leo Varadkar by the end of 2022.

EARLY LIFE AND FAMILY

Michael was born on August 1, 1960 to parents Paddy Moran and Eileen Lana Corbett, and he has a twin brother named Padraig.

He is the third child in a family of five, has two brothers and two sisters and was raised in the Co Cork Fork area.

Martin attended Colaiste Chriost Ri and went on to study Art at University College Cork – where he joined Ogra. Fianna Fail.

He completed a Master’s degree in Political History before earning an H. Dip and working as a history teacher at a fee-based high school in Cork called Presentation Brothers College.

After just a year of teaching, Martin quit to become a full-time politician after being elected to the Cork Corporation as a Fianna Fail candidate in 1985.

Martin married college sweetheart Mary O’Shea in 1990. The couple got engaged in the new year and married the following summer.

They had five children together; Michael Aodh, Aoibhe, Cillian, Léana and Ruairi.

FAILURE OF FAMILY

The star couple welcomed their first son, Michael Aodh four years after they married, and daughter Aoibhe two years later.

Their second son Ruairi was born in 1999 but died just five weeks later from death in a crib.

The couple went on to have two more children, Cillian and Léana. But tragedy struck again, when Léana died suddenly at the age of 7.

Leana suddenly developed heart disease just weeks before her death, which was a terrible shock to the family.

Martin, then Foreign Secretary, told the Times of Ireland, describing himself as a father of five who “can make people feel awkward”.

He added: “You’ll always say you have kids you’ve lost. You don’t want to embarrass other people because they might not know, but you don’t want to say someone isn’t a part of it. our lives and our families.”

WORK IMMEDIATELY DURING COVID

In 2020, Martin tells how life has changed for him during the Covid-19 pandemic with his family living in Co Cork and he based in Dublin for work.

Taoiseach has gone months without seeing his family due to Covid’s lockdown.

In May 2020, he told the Late Late Show: “I haven’t seen my family for a few weeks now – about six or seven weeks I would say.

“We’re talking on the phone. We’re doing the Zoom part. I’m on the phone more often. The lockdown started – West Cork, I’ve been there. I went to Dublin and stayed since and that’s it. accomplished.”

And in January 2021, with another month of shutdown looming, Taoiseach told the Irish Sun how he and his wife Mary had found a ban on social visits for other households. the most difficult of the restrictions because he misses his family and friends.

And he said that their children Michael Aodh, Aoibhe and Cillian, all in their 20s, have also suffered the impact of Covid on their college and work experiences.

STORIES IN POLITICAL FAMILY

Martin said his three children repeatedly engage him about the decisions he makes with the Government about restrictions and the comments he makes about the pandemic.

He told the Irish Sun: “Non-stop. All are the same. They will say ‘You shouldn’t say this’, or ‘You should do this’ or ‘You shouldn’t decide that’ or ‘You should go that way’ etc.

“But they are also a source of information. They are very interested in public health and what is working and what other countries are doing and so they will give you a Covid article and the latest research etc.

“All three of them are wary of what’s going on around that way, especially Covid if there’s an article to be written.”

ELECTION OF TAOISEACH

Martin has elect a new leader of the country in a historic vote in June 2020, forming the 33rd Dail.

In his first speech as the country’s leader, Michael Martin praised his wife Mary and children, who were unable to see him elected Taoiseach due to Covid restrictions.

His niece, Kate Martin, who is a nurse at Mater Hospital in Dublin, was the only member of his family present at the Convention Center when he was elected Taoiseach.

“My wife Mary has been my pillar of support and life partner since our college days,” he says.

“Our children have accepted my many years of absence. As they have grown, learned and experienced the world they have not only supported me, they have allowed Mary and I to benefit from their views of Ireland in which they grew up.

“I am so fortunate to have been born into the home my late parents created for me and my siblings at the heart of the tight-knit working-class community in which I have a special identity. great grace to represent at Dáil Éireann.”

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