bullying claims for what they are — a deeply entrenched and nasty attitude that festers within the party.

While the party’s representation at local and national level may have witnessed a significant bounce in recent years, causally brushing off allegations of intimation and simply putting it down to local misunderstandings and naivety around how the word of politics works should not be tolerated.

Saturday will be a historic day for Sinn Féin.

For the first time in almost 35 years, the party will choose someone who is not Gerry Adams as Sinn Féin president.

And in Mary Lou McDonald, members will be selecting a woman, from the Republic of Ireland, who had no direct involvement in the Troubles.

Her elevation, and the selection of Michelle O’Neill as leas-Uachtarán should mark a new departure for Sinn Féin.

The growing party, which went from having 54 city and council seats before the 2014 local elections to 157 after, should see the transfer of leadership to a new generation as an even greater opportunity for expansion and possibly even government.

But under the swell of new and fresh faces, which have bolstered Sinn Féin benches in the Dáil and across local authorities, lie mounting allegations of bullying and intimidation which have caused the resignations, suspensions, or expulsions of at least 15 elected representatives in recent years.

Just five days out from her selection — or coronation, depending on what view you take — the party has yet again been marred by a resignation and more allegations, with Ms McDonald dragged into the centre of it all.

Many of those who have raised bullying claims in recent years said they had initially contacted Ms McDonald with their concerns; as leader she will now have to seriously address the growing problem.

The list of those who have quit or been forced from Sinn Féin is growing and was added to yesterday with the resignation of Noeleen Reilly amid claims of bullying, harassment, and assault.

But the string of allegations go back for many years:

June 2015

After an internal party review Cork councillor Kieran McCarthy was expelled from the party, while councillor Melissa Mullane was suspended for 12 months.

The action followed an internal inquiry which focused on a fractious relationship between Sinn Féin members and the then sitting TD Sandra McLellan.

It had been reported that there were severe tensions among members over whether the party should run one or two candidates in the 2016 general election in the constituency.

September 2015

Fermoy-based councillor June Murphy stepped down after she claimed she had been unwillingly and unavoidably caught up in the bitter party row.

“I have found my time in the party to be an increasingly negative experience,” said Ms Murphy, who was elected to Cork County Council in 2014, said in a statement.

February 2016

Cork East TD Sandra McLellan decided not to run in the 2016 election, claiming her job became impossible because

of efforts to “undermine and malign” her.

April 2017

Just three years after joining the party, Kildare councillor Sorcha O’Neill resigned, claiming she had been a

victim of “bullying, hostility, and aggression”.

Five other local Sinn Féin activists quit the party at the same time.

June 2017

Eugene Greenan, the youngest member of Cavan County Council, stepped down from his position on the local authority last summer but remained a Sinn Féin member.

However, he said he was forced to quit after difficulties continued, especially around the selection of his successor. Resigning from the party in December, Mr Greenan said in a statement: “I cannot be a member of an organisation that treats its members so poorly and that effortlessly disregards its mantra of fairness and equality.”

July 2017

Paul Hogan joined Sinn Féin when he was 15 and was first elected to Westmeath County Council in 2004.

He ran for the party in three general elections — 2007, 2011, 2016 — and one byelection, but resigned after claiming that when a relationship ended, he had been subject to an “unrelenting campaign” by colleagues who, he said, had sent him “hate mail”.

September 2017

Sinn Féin’s youngest councillor, Lisa Marie Sheehy, said she was forced to resign from the party due to a “hostile and toxic” stance that exists against people who “stand up to the strict disciplinary approach” it takes.

The 23-year-old Limerick representative said she had been put under intense pressure to work during her final exams in University College Cork.

September 2017

The party took the decision to expel three councillors following an unresolved row at Wicklow County Council.

Gerry O’Neill, John Snell, and Oliver O’Brien were all ejected from the party after they disagreed about how Sinn Féin had selected a replacement on the council for newly elected TD John Brady. They also objected to the selection of a relatively new councillor, Nicola Lawless, to lead the Sinn Féin group on the council.

November 2017

The resignation of Tipperary councillor Seamus Morris followed a bitter nine-month dispute. The Nenagh-based councillor told the Tipperary Star that there was a “nasty culture in the party who believed in dictating to councillors from darkened rooms”.

In the same month, Trevor Ó Clochartaigh, who had been a Sinn Féin senator since 2011, left the party with immediate effect, citing concerns about “serious breaches” of conduct and “unacceptable behaviour” in Galway West.

December 2017

Just days after the resignation of Mr Ó Clochartaigh, Athenry-based councillor Gabe Cronnelly announced his departure from the party.

In a statement, he said he was resigning due to “ongoing unrest around the way the party is dealing with unethical behaviour”.

February 2018

Noeleen Reilly, who had been a party member for 17 years, became the latest elected representative to leave Sinn Féin.

Announcing her resignation yesterday morning, she said she had been “the victim of an orchestrated bullying campaign”.

Her announcement followed a decision by the ard comhairle to suspend her for six months.

On becoming Sinn Féin president, Ms McDonald will have to deal with bullying in her party if it is to ever succeed in becoming a member of government.

In an interview with the Irish Examiner last year, Ms McDonald seemed to dismiss any notion of widescale problems, saying that “you will have all the aches and pains and bumps and bullying in every organisation”.

She said that as the party becomes “more diverse and as new people come in and so on”, of course “personality clashes” would arise.

But the leader-in-waiting stressed that Sinn Féin has strong procedures in place to deal with any claims of bullying.

“Personally I would not be comfortable and I would not be happy and I would not stand over an organisation in which bullying was rampant, but that’s not the case in the party,” she said.

Rampant or not, Ms McDonald will not want to see the departure of any other representative under the shadow of bullying allegations.