Sick taunts of the anti-immigrant thugs

By Hugh Jordan (for the Sunday World)

Above (right) is the sick five-finger salute from a loyalist anti-immigrant thug that has sent a Troubles victim into a cycle of despair.

Billy McManus – whose father was shot dead in the Sean Graham’s bookies shop massacre 30 years ago – came face to face with the hate-filled yob as far-right mobs rampaged through Belfast.

For father-of-two Billy, being confronted by the brazen loyalist – who raised five fingers at him and jeered about the five innocent Catholics cut down by the UFF that day – forced him to relive the day he lost his father and other good friends in the mass shooting.

“One man wearing a Rangers top saw me and he raised his hand in the air showing his five fingers. It was a clear reference to what had happened in the bookies shop,” Mr McManus told us this week.

He added: “To tell you the truth, it gave me flashbacks to the Sean Graham’s shootings.”

Two weeks ago, Billy left his mum’s home to search for his 12-year-old daughter after learning a loyalist mob was making its way up the Ormeau Road.

And seconds after finding the missing youngster, he was confronted by a burly sectarian thug a few yards from the spot where his father lost his life 30 years before.

A brazen hooligan – pictured here wearing a Rangers away top – then held five fingers aloft before shouting out: “Look who we have here!”

Other loyalists, who had spilled across the Ormeau Road, also turned their attentions to Mr McManus.

And cupping their hands in gun shapes, they made out to shoot him.

Mr McManus, who manages a leisure and sports complex in the lower Ormeau area, described what happened: “I had just left my mum’s house and was walking up the Ormeau Road.

“I saw one police jeep and hundreds of loyalists coming behind it. By the time I got there, members of this community had come out and stopped them.

“More police arrived and got themselves between local residents and the protesters who had come up from the city centre.

“It quickly became obvious this wasn’t a protest, it was just a hate fest of sectarianism.

“They were mocking what happened at Sean Graham’s bookies. They were making out to shoot people and shouting ‘five-nil’ in reference to the people who died in the betting shop.

“It quickly became a stand-off, but there weren’t enough police officers there to deal with it.

“Eventually more police arrived and pushed them back up towards the university. But we could hear them breaking the windows of the hotels and they were cheering.”

“But for a good ten or 15 minutes here, it was a terrible thing to see on the Ormeau Road at the very place where the shootings happened.

“I was with my daughter when one man saw me and said, ‘Look who we have here’ and he raised his five fingers in the air. Others were shouting 5-0 and making out to shoot us,” said Mr McManus.

He added: “I know this type of thing happened on the Ormeau Road in the years after the shooting. But I never thought I’d see it again.”

Billy McManus maintains the PSNI has major questions to answer as to how this was allowed to happen.

“Knowing the history of the Ormeau Road and what happened here, these people should never have been allowed anywhere near this area.

“How the police allowed them to walk from the city centre up through Botanic Avenue, along University Avenue and onto the Ormeau Road without stopping them is beyond me. It’s baffling.

“This wasn’t anything to do with immigration. What happened here last Saturday was pure sectarianism. It was nothing else.

“People were abused and then they put five fingers in the air and shouting ‘five-nil’. There’s only one word for it and it’s sectarianism. They knew exactly what they were doing.

“But my family wasn’t the only ones to be targeted. Other families who lost loved ones in Sean Graham’s were also abused.

“It was all singing and dancing and shouting sectarian abuse at people. As well as protecting my own child, I was also concerned for other youngsters from the area in case they get caught up in something and ended up with a criminal record.

“I got a lot of flashbacks to what happened at Sean Graham’s bookies shop all those years ago.

“We were in the exact same place on Saturday. Kids were crying and screaming. People were shouting and the police sirens were screaming.

“For me, it was Sean Graham’s all over again, but this time, my daughter was with me,” he said.

He added: “I never thought I’d see it again, but I did.”

The anti-immigrant mob then went on a rampage, smashing foreign-owned shops in the Botanic area.

On February 5 1993, Billy McManus’s father William (54) was one of five Catholics who lost their lives when loyalist gunmen from the Ulster Freedom Fighters entered Sean Graham’s bookies shop and opened fire.

Four of the victims, including Billy’s dad, died at the scene and many others were injured.

James Kennedy, the youngest person to lose his life, was a 15-year-old schoolboy. The others were Jack Duffin (66), Christy Doherty (52) and Peter Magee (18).

Following the shootings, a 23 year-old loyalist from east Belfast was arrested and charged with possession of an assault rifle used in the attack.

After a trial, he was convicted of possession of the weapon, but he five murder charges against him were cleared.

It is now accepted a number of state agents played major roles in the attack.

Two UFF killers Joe Bratty and Raymond Elder, who both played minor roles in the Sean Graham’s attack, were shot dead by the IRA 18 months later.

Urgent Appeal