Proinsias Mac Aonghusa, Date of Birth, Place of Birth, Date of Death
TweetProinsias Mac Aonghusa
Irish writer and activist
Date of Birth: 
Place of Birth: Galway, Connacht, Ireland
About Proinsias Mac Aonghusa
- Proinsias Mac Aonghusa (English: Francis McGuinness; 23 June 1933 – 28 September 2003) was an Irish journalist, writer, tv presenter and campaigner. Mac Aonghusa was a broadcaster for Radio Éireann in 1952, and for RTÉ, UTV and BBC television from the 1960s.
- In 1962, he won a Jacob's Award for his Irish language broadcasting on RTÉ television. He ran for election as a candidate of the Irish Labour Party, and became vice-chairman of the party.
- He encouraged the formation of the Young Labour League and edited and wrote an introduction to Corish Speaks, a collection of speeches by Brendan Corish, who was then leader of the party.
- He became involved in the republican Wolfe Tone Society in late 1966, and he was expelled from the Labour Party on 12 January 1967 for "activities injurious" to the party.
- He ran as an independent candidate in 1969, but thereafter became more concerned with the revival of the Irish language and with nationalist politics.
- His wife, Catherine McGuinness (née Ellis), also left the party at this time, and later became a justice of the Supreme Court of Ireland. During 1974 and 1975, Mac Aonghusa worked as a United Nations Special Representative to southern Africa with Seán MacBride.
- He was an admirer of Charles Haughey whom he regularly praised in his column in the Sunday Press written under the pseudonym "Gulliver".
- He wrote several books, most in the Irish language and was a member of the Arts Council of Ireland for many years.
- He was chairman of Bord na Gaeilge, and president of Conradh na Gaeilge between 1989 and 1994.
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