Eirigi - Irish socialist's or just Irish dissidents?

This week I have come across a leaflet that was being handed out in Belfast over the weekend. Now as a bit of a political anorak, I love pouring over election/campaign leaflets- not caring from which party they are produced by. But this leaflet does leave me worried, it was produced by Eirigi. now "who are they" you may ask?


The leaflet describes themselves as a campaigning party with the aim of forming a 32 county Irish Socialist Republic. Now I am proud to call myself a socialist, but I am not one for the likes of those who seem to live in 'cloud cuckoo land' the Socialist Workers Party, Respect and the hopefully now finished Militant. Dreamers and chatterers, and the ones I have met seem to come from middle class or privileged backgrounds. Now at first these seem to be an Irish version of the SWP, originating in Dublin but in their move to expand North they seem to have attracted a different type of member. The Irish Republican who has become disaffected with Sinn Fein and their 'friends' in the IRA.


Respect, Galloway, SWP, Troops Out, all of those organisations in the UK have at some time supported Sinn Fein, trouble is if you do have a true aim of forming a Socialist Republic in Ireland, you have to gain support of the Protestant community. having ex Sinn Fein members in your ranks is not going to help on that front.


So in the North at least, Eirigi have become just a front for dissident republican groups. Now since the murders last month, Eirigi have tried to accuse the media of falsely linking them to the atrocities, trouble is their spokesman in Lurgan - Colin Duffy has been arrested and since charged with the murder of the two young soldiers in Antrim.


So I have no wish to see Eirigi leaflets in Belfast or for that anywhere in Ireland. Now I do wish we could see a Govt in Northern Ireland that is elected on political views rather than religious/sectarian views. So I would like to see Labour and the Lib Dems join the Tories in fighting elections in the Province. Voters on the Protestant Shankhill Road and the Catholic Falls Road have far more in common with each other than a farmer in County Wexford or a civil servant in North Down or a Dublin suburb.


It has to be the mainstream parties that get the ball rolling, because as seen with the likes of Eirigi, any fringe party will end up becoming attached to one side of the divide or other.

Football goes to the dogs!

Today I went with a friend of mine too see Lisburn Distillery play Coleraine in the Irish Football League. The first time I had been to an Irish game since 1996. Now for any of you bored by the millionaire clubs of the Premier League or the same boring midweek Champions League games - this is the place to come and watch your football. Similar to the English Non-League scene, crowds are slightly higher but the football is if similar standard. The Irish grounds are like a flashback to the early 70;s and like non league football, you always seem to find yourself ending up in the social club!
My friend is a Coleraine fan so that is why we ended up in Lisburn. Actually it wasn't Lisburn, that is the club name but the ground is closer to West Belfast than Lisburn city centre. the ground is out in the country - on the outskirts of Belfast. the ground is also the home of greyhounds, and by the state of the racetrack restaurant, the dogs are doing better finacially than the football. They even have different names for their shared stadium, the football club calling the ground- New Grosvenor Stadium whilst the Greyhound fraternity use the Drumbo Park name. So if you want to pay £9 to see a game rather than £29 and be allowed to have a beer with rival fans in the social club, get yourself across to Belfast and get your fix of football with a 1970's feel.

Soldiers remembered from Belfast to County Mayo

Today in Belfast we will see something that many of us never thought we would ever see, the Army parading through the streets of Belfast. This is the homecoming parade for servicemen returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. But as would be expected in Northern Ireland, it can never be that simple and the day will also see a separate parade by Sinn Fein who said their parade was to protest about the British Army presence in Northern Ireland, Iraq and Afghanistan. Many on the left in Ireland and some in the Nationalist and Republican communities felt that Sinn Fein should have just ignored the parade rather than put in a separate march. There have been concessions on both sides with no RAF flypast and the soldiers marching without weapons and Sinn Fein agreeing to changes in their march route. But why did Sinn Fein march at all? Two main reasons that I can think of, they feared that the loyalist community would hijack the British Army parade and turn it into a re-run of July 12th but I believe the main reason was that when they heard of a planned dissident republican march they felt they had to form some sort of protest. I believe they were wrong and should have not organised their own protest and should not have linked the 'troubles' and the role of the Army in it with the return of British/Irish troops from Iraq and Afghanistan.

But in the Republic the peace process has seen changes to the way those in the Republic remember their war dead. As with Sinn Fein today, the Irish Government has felt it hard to remember the Irish servicemen who have laid down their lives in both the First World War and since. of course those who volunteered to fight in WW1 were doing so when Ireland was still governed by the British, and maybe understandably that in the 1920's and 30's it was not seen right to remember those who had been seen to lay down their lives for the British Empire but many Irish also volunteered to fight with the Allies in the Second World War and many Irishmen have also served since in Korea and even in Vietnam as members of the US and Australian armed forces. Now those in the Republic feel that they can remember those who lost their lives in the conflicts of the 20th century with no concern for whose county they were serving at the time.

on October 17th this year, the Irish President, Mary McAleese performed the official opening of the County Mayo Peace Park in Castlebar, county Mayo. This fantastic memorial remembers all those from County Mayo who have lost their lives in war, whether they were fighting in the 1st World War with the British Army or since with the British, Canadians, Australians or with their own army in such places as the Lebanon.

So it may take a little longer for Sinn Fein to remember that the soldiers we are welcoming home today in Belfast are Irish soldiers who have been trying to give peace to Iraq and Afghanistan and that it should not be seen as an opportunity to make a political statement about their view of the army's role in the 'troubles'. It has taken many in the south over 80 years to realise that the 11th November and war memorials in towns and villages are there to remember those who have given their lives so that we have the freedom to protest on what we want and where we want.

Fuel for thought!

One thing that annoys me when talking about Northern Ireland to those who have an interest in the subject but have never been to the Province is how some (mainly on the left) have this romantic view of those in the IRA being some sort of freedom fighters.


I can understand that the political climate of the 1960's and the start of the troubles in the 1970's would lead some to joining paramilitaries on both sides of the divide with what they thought were good intentions such as feeling they were defending their communities but within a very short time both the IRA and the Loyalist organisations were taken over by criminal gangs. When I was in Ireland we often believed that the rival sides were in collusion when it came to criminal activity in Belfast but it seems that even the supposed Republican stronghold of South Armagh are working hand in hand with the Loyalist gangs of West Belfast.


This BBC news story here details recent arrests in Loyalist West Belfast at a suspected illegal fuel dump, with the smuggled fuel originating in Republican South Armagh.


I spent many months watching fuel tankers move across the South Armagh border and we knew that some of the profit from selling this fuel would end up in the IRA war chest but not many of us would have thought it would have also been helping fill the pockets of Loyalist terrorist gangs.


So forget this romantic views of Michael Collins, Freedom fighters, the majority of the members of both the IRA and the Loyalist gangs were nothing more than gangsters.

A fuel tanker leaves the complex owned by Slab Murphy on the South Armagh border, after a raid by Police from both sides of the border in 2006. Slab has been accused on a number of occasions of being a senior member of the IRA Army Council, wonder if any of his fuel ended up on the loyalist Shankill Road?

Northen Ireland elections

After serving in Northern Ireland on three occasions and on the last time actually living in Belfast with my family, I take a great interest in the political situation 'across the water'.
This week has seen elections that will hopefully lead to Stormont taking control of Northern Ireland again. I think Tony Blair and Peter Hain should be congratulated for their determination to find a political solution to the problems in Northern Ireland.
It is a mark of how far along the road to peace Ireland has come in that this election was almost like an election here in the UK and that is probably the first time that has happened for over 40 years.
I believe that we could have reached this point many years earlier if the main stream parties from over here had organised and got themselves involved in politics in Ireland. it could have helped stopped the voting by religion and replaced it with people voting on principles and real policies.
For those interested in politics in Northern Ireland I would recommend this blog: Your friend in the north blog and for a review of the election this post.