Collusion is not an illusion – That would be Sinn Fein resistance!

John McAnulty

19th August 2003

The August Feile an Phobail in West Belfast ended with the latest Sinn Fein campaign – a march against state collusion in sectarian murder.

The turnout was small, limited to the republican leadership’s most diehard supporters.  This is hardly surprising when we consider the nature of the campaign.  It was a campaign against ghosts.  Posters condemned Patrick Mayhew, a former British secretary of state, Margaret Thatcher, former leaders of British intelligence and the RUC – all long gone from the political stage.  An obvious question was:  Where are the posters condemning Blair and the new RUC/PSNI leader Orde?

The answer is that Sinn Fein is poised to join the new policing boards, so it is not the case that they argue that collusion is a current problem.  The campaign against collusion is in fact a sham, demanding simply that historical files be released.  Sinn Fein have only one campaign – a campaign to bring back Stormont and return Sinn Fein bums to ministerial seats.

This is criminal behaviour, because collusion is not an illusion, nor is it history.  The day after the Sinn Fein march a Protestant married to a Catholic in one of Belfast’s loyalist estates announced that he was bringing the police to court because of their total failure, after countless attacks on his home, to take any kind of action against the UDA gang who were intimidating him.  Areas all over the north, especially in counties Antrim and Derry, are the subject of ethnic cleansing by loyalist mobs.  The role of the British state is to turn a blind eye and to actually pour millions in subsidies into the hands of the gangs, to persuade them to be more political and to provide community leadership!

Meanwhile Sinn Fein have announced their next campaign – a time warp to recreate one of the early civil rights marches demanding not opposition to Stormont but its return!.  Collusion is an not illusion – Sinn Fein resistance is!