The UVF
attacks on the Short Strand area of Belfast over the last days and the
clashes between Catholic and Protestant youth demonstrate that despite
the claims of the various ministers at Stormont, the underlying tensions
and conflicts in the North have neither been resolved nor overcom
The UVF
attacks on the Short Strand area of Belfast over the last days and the
clashes between Catholic and Protestant youth demonstrate that despite
the claims of the various ministers at Stormont, the underlying tensions
and conflicts in the North have neither been resolved nor overcome.
The
Short Strand area has often been the site of conflict passing
periodically from a state of psychological siege to a physical and
sometimes bloody siege, not just recently but going back to the 1920’s.
Reports on the recent events indicate that shots were fired from both
sides.
The trigger for the recent events seems to have been the
rerouting of an Orange march that was planned to pass through Ardoyne
prompting a loyalist riot. But there has been low level sectarian
activity over the past period also. The Short Strand is an easy target
surrounded by overwhelmingly Protestant areas in what used to be the
industrial heart of the city.
The loyalists claim that Protestant
rights have been denied, but the truth is that it isn’t the Catholic
workers and youth to blame. It is the crisis of capitalism that has
eaten away at East Belfast over decades. Shorts Bombardier has shrunken
away, Sirocco has gone. The whole area has been deindustrialised and now
the Protestant workers are in the same situation as the unskilled
Catholic workers who were historically excluded from many of the skilled
jobs in the area. In some ways the situation is worse, as the loss of
the industry and the jobs that went with it has been felt more in the
Protestant areas.
The Good Friday and St Andrews agreements
resulted in the carve up of political power in the North between two
main camps, neither of which offer any way out of the blind alley.
Existing tensions have been fuelled by the economic crisis, while many
workers on either side see no tangible benefit from the debates and
posturing at Stormont.
Tensions have risen during the economic
crisis and in the absence of a clear political alternative, many are
pulled towards sectarian groups egged on by some politicians or towards
the so called dissident republicans. Loyalist attacks such as these give
the still armed republican groups the opportunity to point to the
decommissioning of weapons as evidence that Catholic communities have no
means of self defence.
In the Short Strand, that argument can
gain ground. At the end of June 1970 the Short Strand was attacked by
overwhelming numbers of loyalists. The defence of the area, which was
led by Billy McKee a founder of the Provos, was instrumental in
developing the position of the Provisionals in Belfast. The defence of
St Matthew’s Church has acquired an important place in the history of
the Provisionals. However, Billy McKee himself who is now 89 was
recently interviewed in the Irish News where he distanced himself from
Sinn Féin (SF), while coming over as a devout mass-going Catholic with
no regrets regarding the armed campaign and the bombing campaign of the
early 1970’s. This must be very worrying for the leadership of SF, as it
indicates that there is fertile ground for the “dissidents”. Billy
himself would probably have been out last night if it wasn’t for
infirmity.
At the same time, yesterday’s reports claimed that
while the UVF attacks have been linked to the march through Ardoyne,
there are tensions within the leadership of the UVF which may also have
contributed to the events. The run up to July 12th is likely to see
further conflict. Once again last night gun shots were reported.
Unemployment,
low wages, poor housing and lack of opportunity for the youth saps the
life out of communities. While we can point out the reasons why tensions
between Catholic and Protestant can be exacerbated because of the
impasse in society, we can’t leave it at that. There are no solutions to
the problems of workers and youth from either side on the basis of
capitalism and within the narrow boundaries of the North of Ireland.
The
crisis of capitalism – which is particularly severe in Ireland – has
produced mass, united, working class struggles across Europe. In the
South we have seen unprecedented mass mobilisations in the recent
period. In Britain the workers are beginning to flex their muscles, as
the March 26 demonstration and the coming June 30 strike action confirm.
The same issues that affect workers in England, Wales and Scotland,
from the raising of the age of retirement, to cuts in education and
healthcare, also affect workers in the North of Ireland.
It is
because of this that the present resurgence of sectarianism can be cut
across by united working class struggle. But there is no guarantee that
this will be the only perspective. The latest sectarian conflict in the
Short Strand area of Belfast confirms what the Marxists have always
maintained: that so long as capitalism survives in Ireland it will bring
recurring crises, with growing unemployment and social degradation, the
breeding ground for sectarian strife.
As James Connolly wrote in 1914:
“Such
a scheme as that agreed to by Redmond and Devlin, the betrayal of the
national democracy of industrial Ulster, would mean a carnival of
reaction both North and South, would set back the wheels of progress,
would destroy the oncoming unity of the Irish Labour movement and
paralyse all advanced movements whilst it endured.“To it Labour
should give the bitterest opposition, against it Labour in Ulster should
fight even to the death, if necessary, as our fathers fought before
us.”
Connolly’s prediction is very clear and given
the history of the last 40 or so years is very accurate. Connolly fought
for a United Socialist Ireland which he saw as the only guarantee for
the rights of the Protestant minority in the North at the time. He
understood that only in a socialist Ireland could the rights of both
Catholics and Protestants be respected. That remains as true today as it
was then. There is a huge political vacuum in the North that needs to
be filled by a mass socialist alternative. There are no short cuts to
building such an alternative. The impasse of world capitalism, however,
has shown the potential power of working people in the Middle East,
North Africa, Greece and Spain, every night on prime time television.
The North of Ireland is not excluded from that process.
Source: Fightback (Ireland)
