MOSCOW (Sputnik) — Gerry Adams, the leader of Irish Sinn Fein party, has said he would be stepping down in 2018 as the party leader and would not run for re-election in Dail, the lower chamber of the Republic of Ireland's parliament.
"Leadership means knowing when it's time for change, and that time is now. I will not be standing for the Dail in the next election… This is also my last ard fheis [conference] as [Sinn Fein] uachtaran [president]," Adams said Saturday at a Sinn Fein conference.
The party president added he was in favor of a special conference to be held in 2018 to elect a new leader.
Adams has been the head of Sinn Fein since 1983 and the leader of the party's faction in Dail since 2011. Sinn Fein holds 23 seats in a 158-seat lower house of the Irish parliament.
