'Ban Anarchists from Dublin', says Royston Brady

dublin | rights, freedoms and repression | opinion/analysis Thursday April 08, 2004 16:55 by Deirdre Clancy - Personal Capacity

Northside News joins in media hysteria

I picked up a copy of the Northside News today, as the front page news was that my old school, Greendale Community School in Kilbarrack, is closing down. However, rather than supporting the campaigners who are trying to keep the school open, a school which has nurtured and generated a lot of literary and cultural talent in the last couple of decades, Royston Brady is on p. 7 demanding that ararchists, and what he calls 'anti-globalisation extremists', be banned from Dublin on May 1st.

The article in question is clearly sympathetic to Brady's viewpoint, implying that many anti-globalisation protestors have 'a record for rioting and other violent behaviour', and should be prevented from entering Dublin coming up to May 1st. Brady is quoted as saying that gardai 'should step up their presence at Dublin Airport, Dublin Port and Euro-port in Rosslare to ensure that those intent on causing trouble, damage or injury are prevented from entering the country'. He suggests that European police forces should co-operate in the same way that they co-operate to stop football hooligans from crossing borders.

He is then cited as saying that those who have 'genuinely held views against the expansion of the EU have every right to stage peaceful protests in Dublin, or any other city.' Clearly, if he believes in the right to peaceful protest, then he should come out in support of those protestors who were beaten up by gardai in the previous Mayday peaceful protests, where the only violence in evidence was that of several guards.

This is another example of the media hysteria around 1 May and the plans of those of us who wish to exercise our democratic right to protest. The contradiction between acknowledging the right to peaceful protest and the failure to condemn authorities who break the law by perpetrating violence on protestors is another instance of the confused nature of these reactionary rants against leftist activists. The adamant insistence that it is protestors who break the law, when clearly the government, through its allowing of Shannon Airport to be used as a military stopover in a supposedly neutral territory, and through its lies and deceit at the planning tribunal, and so on, is the most culpable in this respect, is just another indication of the double standards which accompany the scaremongering regarding left-wing protestors and their intentions. It is also indicative of a legislature which punishes overt 'crime', while failing adequately to punish the covert crimes of businesspeople and politicians in this country.

Brady concludes by saying that 'the city council will be staying in close contact with the gardai in order to ensure that May 1, 2004 goes down in the history books of our city as a day we can be proud of.' I think it's important that activists who wish to resist the militarisation of Europe and its further collusion in economic policies which cripple less developed areas of the globe also stay in close contact with one another. Let's make May 1 go down in history as the day the Irish left united in resistance to reactionary politicians such as Brady, and staged an impressive protest against economic imperialism and militarism - a day we can all be proud of.