History of Sinn Féin trend of power in both Sinn Féin and the IRA shifting north. In particular, Ó'Brádaigh's part in the 1975 IRA ceasefire had damaged his reputation in the eyes of Ulster republicans. The prisoners' protest climaxed with the 1981 hunger strike, during which striker Bobby Sands was elected Member of Parliament for Fermanagh and South Tyrone with the help of the Sinn Féin publicity machine. After his death on hunger strike, his seat was held, with an increased vote, by his election agent, Owen Carron, and two IRA volunteers were also elected to Dáil Éireann. These successes helped convince republicans that
Hunger strike a 62-day hunger strike in 1976 which he began as a campaign to be repatriated to Ireland. In 1980, seven Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) prisoners in the Maze Prison launched a hunger strike as a protest against the revocation by the UK government of a prisoner-of-war-like Special Category Status for paramilitary prisoners in Northern Ireland. The strike, led by Brendan Hughes, was called off before any deaths, when the Government seemed to offer to concede their demands; however, the Government then reneged on the details of the agreement. The prisoners then called another hunger strike the following year. This