SF claim nationalists ignored and exluded in NI
Heated exchanges in Assembly during debate over flags, identity and tradition
SINN Fein MLAS have said there is little equality for nationalists in Northern Ireland, with street names, public buildings and statues overwhelmingly reflecting the British and unionist tradition.
Pat Sheehan said that his own constituency had the Royal Victoria Hospital, with Sinn Fein offices in Sevastopol Street leading onto Odessa Street — “two sites of battles in the Crimean War”.
Other places like the Kashmir Road “right in the heart of republican west Belfast” were named after “British imperial rampaging”.
Speaking in the Assembly, Mr Sheehan said that on his way to Stormont, he drove up Prince of Wales Avenue, “although some of us who have a certain background describe it as POW Avenue”.
He then passed a statue of Sir Edward Carson before coming into Parliament Buildings where Lord Craigavon sat at the top of the stairs. “There is an imbalance,” he said.
The West Belfast MLA’S remarks drew an angry response from the DUP’S Christopher Stalford who said: “Anyone who refers to Prince of Wales Avenue as POW Avenue is the very last person who should be talking about protecting human rights.”
DUP MLA Trevor Clarke said Mr Sheehan had belonged to a “terrorist organisation” when he was a prisoner.
Rejecting the claim Stormont symbolism was insulting, Mr Clarke said Mr Sheehan had “gone out of his way to be offended by our tradition”. He added: “I don’t know why he had to go up Prince of Wales Avenue. What was wrong with Massey Avenue?”
The DUP MLA said that unionists were offended by the “glorification of terrorism” on west Belfast walls.
The exchanges occurred during a debate on an Alliance motion calling on Arlene Foster and Michelle O’neill to publish the Commission on Flags, Identity, Culture and Tradition (FICT) report.
It also urged them to bring the report’s recommendations to the Executive for review and “to ensure leadership on these issues and to move Northern Ireland forward together as a united community”. Ms Bradshaw said that the £800,000 report given to The Executive Office seven months ago should not be concealed from the public.
Sinn Fein MLA Emma Sheerin repeated her party’s opposition to unionists’ proposal to install “a floating six counties made of stone” at Stormont to mark Northern Ireland’s centenary. She said that street names, public buildings and statues here “reflect the dominance of one tradition and the exclusion of another”.
She accused unionism of a “failure of leadership” in attempting to “maintain a status quo that has long gone”.
Ms Sheerin said the days of “majority rule” were over, not just in terms of unionism and nationalism, but regarding “so many new communities which must be seen and heard”.
Her party colleague, Martina Anderson, said nationalists had been born into an “exclusionary Orange state” which “neither wanted nor welcomed us”.
She said: “To this day, DUP politicians continue to treat with disdain the flag, identity, culture and language of the Irish tradition. Anti-irish diatribe has been characteristic of some unionist politicians who proudly light bonfires bedecked with Irish flags and boastfully insult Irish republicans and nationalists with remarks like ‘Coronavirus is a Taig plague’, ‘Curry my yogurt’, ‘feeding the crocodiles’, stopping bursaries for aspiring Irish language speakers, and even changing the Irish name on a boat.
“That wasn’t any of us going out of our way to be offended, that was offence.”
Ms Anderson claimed that some parties appeared to be whipping up their base “into a toxic sectarian frenzy perhaps in an effort to stop their votes haemorrhaging”.
Mr Stalford said that he was a member of the Orange Order, Royal Black Institution, and Apprentice Boys. He said that he would always defend “the dignified display of the flag of my country” but opposed any paramilitary emblems.
He noted that the number of attacks on Orange halls had risen since 1994 when “we have supposedly become a more peaceful society”, and said that the statistics suggested intolerance by some.
UUP MLA Doug Beattie said that while a FICT commissioner he had suggested a reduction in the number of memorials in Northern Ireland, but this had been rejected. He said it was shameful that “there are more memorials to murderers, rapists and child abusers than there are to their victims”.
‘To this day, DUP politicians continue to treat with disdain the flag, identity, culture and language of the Irish tradition’