1998 in Ireland

Incumbents

• President: Mary McAleese
• Taoiseach: Bertie Ahern
• Tánaiste: Mary Harney
• Minister for Finance: Charlie McCreevy
• Chief Justice: Liam Hamilton
• Dáil: 28th
• Seanad: 21st

  Events

January

• 1 January – The Vocational Education Committees of the towns of Bray, Drogheda, Sligo, Tralee and Wexford were abolished.
• 14 January – The Mahon Planning Tribunal opened in Dublin Castle.

  February

• 27 February – Ireland qualified for entry into the Economic and Monetary Union of the European Union.

  March

• 15 March – Former Fine Gael party minister Hugh Coveney died in a fall from a cliff in County Cork.

  April

• 10 April – The British and Irish governments and all the political parties in Northern Ireland signed the Belfast Agreement.

  May

• 22 May – The Good Friday Agreement was endorsed in a referendum by people north and south of the Irish border.

  July

• 1 July – The new Northern Ireland Assembly first met, in "shadow" form; Reg Empey and Seamus Mallon were elected First Minister and Deputy First Minister respectively.
• 11–13 July – The opening stages of the 1998 Tour de France were held in Ireland.

  August

• 15 August – Omagh bombing: 29 people died in a car bomb explosion near the centre of Omagh, County Tyrone by the Real Irish Republican Army.

  September

• 4 September – President Bill Clinton of the United States began his second official visit to the island of Ireland.
• 20 September - The TV3 television station was launched.

  October

• 22 October - Whistleblowers at Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital, Drogheda, drew attention to the excessive number of hysterectomies carried out by surgeon Michael Neary.

  November

• 26 November – Tony Blair became the first Prime Minister of the United Kingdom to address the Oireachtas.
• 30 November – Unemployment fell by 20% with the number of people in work rising by 100,000.

  December

• 12 December – Members of the Labour Party and Democratic Left agreed to merge.
• 26 December – Great Boxing Day Storm : Severe gale-force winds hit northwest Ireland causing heavy disruption to services.
• 31 December – The punt currency was traded for the last time as the euro currency was launched.

  Arts and literature

• 28 February – Actor and comedian Dermot Morgan died suddenly in London.
• 25 May – Patrick McCabe's novel Breakfast on Pluto was published.
• 3 July – The boyband Westlife was formed.
• 28 August – Maeve Binchy's novel Tara Road was published.
• 20 September – The TV3 television channel went on the air.
• 7 October – Marina Carr's drama By the Bog of Cats opened at the Abbey Theatre, Dublin.
• 24 December – Gay Byrne broadcast his final radio show, from St Stephen's Green, Dublin.
• John Montague became the first occupant of the Ireland Chair of Poetry.
• Garry Hynes became the first woman to win a Tony Award for Best Direction of a Play on Broadway.
• Brendan Graham's Great Famine novel The Whitest Flower was published.
• Terence Dolan's A Dictionary of Hiberno-English: The Irish Use of English was published.

  Sport

Association football

• St Patrick's Athletic won the League of Ireland.
• Cork City won the FAI Cup.
• Shelbourne's home UEFA Cup tie against Rangers was moved to England due to fears of sectarian trouble. Despite taking a 3–0 lead, Shelbourne lost 3–5.
• 8 May – The Irish under-16 team won the European Championship.
• 26 July - The Irish under-18 team won the European Championship.

  Gaelic football

• Galway won the All-Ireland Senior Football Championship, beating Kildare in the final.

  Golf

• Murphy's Irish Open was won by David Carter.

  Hurling

• Offaly won the All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship for the second time in five years.

  Swimming

• 6 August – Olympic gold medalist Michelle Smith was banned from competition for four years for tampering with a drug test.

  Births

• 17 March – Nathan O'Toole, actor
• 8 August – Liam Scales, footballer

  Deaths

• 26 January – Ernest Gébler, writer.
• 8 February – Niall Sheridan, poet, fiction writer and broadcaster.
• 28 February – Dermot Morgan, actor and comedian.
• 15 March – Hugh Coveney, Fine Gael TD and Cabinet Minister, yachtsman.
• 17 April – Robin Lawler, soccer player.
• 6 May – Sybil Connolly, fashion designer.
• 22 May – Jim Power, Galway hurler.
• 26 May – Kate Cruise O'Brien, writer.
• 23 June
• *Paul O'Dwyer, lawyer and politician in the United States.
• *Maureen O'Sullivan, actress.
• 26 July – Seán Ó hEinirí, fisherman, seanchaí and monolingual speaker of the Irish language.
• 13 August – Liam de Paor, historian and archaeologist.
• 20 September – Robert Malachy Burke, Christian Socialist and philanthropist.
• 10 October – Tommy Quaid, Limerick hurler.
• 16 October – Patrick Hickey, visual artist.
• 11 November – Paddy Clancy, folk singer.
• 13 November – Valerie Hobson, actress.
• 21 November – John David Gwynn, cricketer.
• 26 December – Cathal Goulding, Chief of Staff of the Irish Republican Army and the Official IRA.