Fergus McCabe - One in a Million

14 Oct 2020

Fergus was a passionate, articulate and tireless champion for his own community in the North Inner City and he brought the same gifts to his work with Citywide Drugs Crisis Campaign, of which he was a founder member. Over the last 25  years, as part of this work, Fergus travelled to communities all over Ireland to meet with people responding to the drugs crisis, he never said no to a meeting if it was possible for him to make it. Fergus understood what community development is about and he had a gift for it; no meeting was too small or too far away, he shared his knowledge, wisdom and experience with all of us, and he did it with grace, generosity and a lovely sense of humour …and of course always a comment on Spurs!

Fergus has represented the community sector on the National Drugs Strategy Committees since 1996 and continued as a member of the current National Oversight Committee (NOC) until recently. Throughout the many years of his participation on these committees, Fergus was a brilliant advocate for our communities, strong, passionate and principled - that great phrase  “telling truth to power” could have been written for Fergus, because that is what he did, and in doing so, he won the respect of many of those people in power. He has been a leader, a mentor and an inspiration to all of us in Citywide and to countless others involved with the community response to drugs. We will do our best to honour his memory by continuing to do the work that he did so brilliantly. Above all else, Fergus was a wonderful human being and our thoughts and sympathies are with Helena and the family on their profound loss, they have always been his light and inspiration.