Republican News · Thursday 11 October 2001

A 'Grand' night out

BY LAURA FRIEL

The town hall had been booked by the Lisburn based Loyalist Cultural Society and advertised on the extreme 'loyalist voice' website, notorious for its promotion of the Orange Volunteers, a violent Protestant fundamentalist group with a history of sectarian attacks on Catholic families and churches.

Several coaches from Coleraine, Newry and Portadown swelled attendance at the Friday 28 September rally in Ballymena to around 500, the numbers rendering it a 'Grand Protestant Rally' in promise rather than practice. Included among the contingent from Portadown were loyalists who had marched with Johnny Adair in the UDA show of strength at Drumcree in July 2000.

Questioned about the presence of loyalist paramilitaries, one of the rally organisers said he would not discourage anyone who was a "true patriot". DUP Councillors Roy Gillespie and Robin Sterling were also in attendance but remained coy, describing their status as "only observers".

Less shy about their role in the night's proceedings were recent DUP candidates Stephen Moore, who chaired the rally, and Willie Frazer, a guest speaker. This was not an anti-Agreement rally, Moore told the meeting, because he and his colleagues did not recognise the Good Friday Agreement.

But if the gathering began with Orwellian doublethink it soon collapsed into a familiar diet of paranoia and racism. South Belfast based 'Grand Protestant Committee' spokesperson Ray Hamill gave what the Ballymena Guardian incongruously reported as "an historic account of the Protestant faith".

The most evil men in history, Hamill told an appreciative audience, "Hitler, Mussolini, Ribbentropp, were all Roman Catholics," and now Ulster, "the last bastion of Protestantism in Europe", was under threat from a party of government, the Labour Party, which had "disassociated itself from Britishness" and a Prime Minister in league with Rome. Tony Blair was following a Roman Catholic agenda, his wife was a Roman Catholic and his children were being educated as Catholics, said Hamill.

"Tony Blair got rid of Peter Mandelson" and "gave the job to John Reid, another Catholic," said Hamill. "Everything about the papacy and Tony Blair must be dismantled."

With a true fundamentalist's sense of betrayal, Hamill continued: "Tony Blair stood with Muslims yesterday. They are not Christians and years ago they murdered thousands of Britons in Afghanistan."

"In the future no one will be safe from the wrath of the Grand Protestant Committee," warned leading Orangeman Mark Harbinson, a prominent supporter of the Drumcree standoff who has described the protest as "Ulster's Alamo".

Harbinson is a member of the Stoneyford Orange Lodge, where several years ago a loyalist death list containing the names and personal details of hundreds of nationalists was discovered. At the time Harbinson dismissed the raid on the Orange Lodge as a ploy to discredit him.

This rally was only the first in a long-term strategy of defiance, warned Harbinson, which will reflect a growing sense of anger within the Protestant community. The organisers urged those attending to sign a pledge based on Carson's anti-Home Rule Covenant of 1912.

These signatures will bolster plans for the mass mobilisation of the Protestant people for even more demonstrations which are being planned in the run up to next year's marching season, the crowd was told.

"It is every democrat's right to raise arms in defence of democracy. Never let it be said otherwise," said Harbinson. But the Orangeman's commitment to the principles of democracy proved to be mere rhetoric. Harbinson declared that even if 99.9% of the people voted for a united Ireland, he would still oppose it.

Commenting on recent events in the USA, Harbinson continued: "George Bush said countries that harbour terrorists wouldn't be spared. If that's the case, I'll be waiting for the B52 bombers to flatten Dublin."

This is the vision of a one-party state, an intolerant supremacist regime within which one faith is pitched against the other. It is a vision of domination and subordination dressed up as democracy, of vilification and oppression disguised as justice. This is the rhetoric of the exclusive and the politics of exclusion.

The tragedy of all our people lies in the failure of David Trimble to find an alternative vision.

Last week's decision to introduce measures to combat religious discrimination along the lines of established race relations legislation in Britain primarily came in the wake of the recent attacks in the US. A failure to defend the Muslim community in Britain from persecution following the events of 11 September would undermine Blair's foreign policy ambitions in the execution of the current war against Afghanistan.

But alongside that are the appalling scenes of loyalist hatred outside the gates of Holy Cross Primary School and the images of the terrified faces of Catholic children of North Belfast, captured by the international media and witnessed by the world community. If the British government is serious about challenging religious persecution, then we can only welcome that development.