Gerry Kelly to Contest Next Assembly Election for North Belfast

Veteran Sinn Féin MLA Gerry Kelly has announced a reversal of his retirement plans and confirmed he will contest the next Northern Ireland Assembly election in North Belfast, reversing an announcement made in July that he intended to step down.

Explaining his decision, the 73-year-old representative stated that politics in the region is at an "incredibly important juncture" ahead of the May 2027 Assembly and council elections. Kelly said he decided to put his name forward once again for party selection after being approached by Sinn Féin leadership, pledging that if re-elected, he will continue working hard on the ground for the community across North Belfast.

Kelly has represented the area for nearly three decades, having first been elected for North Belfast in the 1996 Northern Ireland Forum election. He has served as an MLA continuously since the establishment of the Assembly in 1998 following the Good Friday Agreement. Alongside Stormont Speaker Edwin Poots, Kelly is one of only two remaining MLAs from the original 1998 mandate.

Prior to his political career, Kelly was convicted in 1973 at the age of 19 alongside eight others, including the Price sisters, for their roles in the Old Bailey bombing, which resulted in one fatality and injured 200 people. While imprisoned, he took part in a 60-day hunger strike demanding political prisoner status and a transfer to Northern Ireland, during which he was force-fed before being transferred to the Maze Prison in April 1975. Kelly was later involved in multiple escape attempts, including the September 1983 breakout when he and 37 other republican prisoners escaped the Maze in Europe's largest prison escape since World War II, subsequently spending three years on the run in Europe.

Looking ahead to the campaign, Kelly described the forthcoming election as an opportunity to secure the future, reaffirming his commitment to represent local residents at Stormont.