Paisley cowered in fear of Slane locals
IAN Paisley was left cowering in a car as he waited for a burger and Diet Coke outside a takeaway near the banks of the Boyne, State papers have revealed.
The DUP leader was nervous about being spotted by locals in Slane, Co. Meath, as he journeyed on the old N2 to Dublin for the trial of his party colleague Peter Robinson. Inside the burger joint, the barrister Desmond Boal, a close associate of Mr Paisley, felt it necessary to deny it was the firebrand preacher.
‘In the meantime, two local youths spotted Paisley in the car,’ a government official reported. ‘Hotly denying (to their obvious amazement) that the occupant of the car was Paisley, Boal was forced to grab the food and to flee the scene without further ado.’
Mr Robinson had been on trial for the bizarre ‘invasion’ in Clontibret, Co. Monaghan the previous year, when some 150 loyalists descended on the village. Mr Robinson’s decision to take part in the escapade, during which gardaí were attacked and missiles thrown at buildings, almost derailed his career.
The takeaway story had been doing the rounds in Belfast for a while and one of those who picked up on it was solicitor PJ McGrory. He passed on the anecdote to an official in the Department of Foreign Affairs, who in turn reported it to the top ranks of government.
Mr McGrory told the official there was a rumour Mr Paisley and Mr Boal had ‘deliberately tried to set up’ Robinson by persuading him to enter a guilty plea. ‘Thus, Robinson could be attacked for having fallen below the standard set by Paisley, who never pleaded guilty whenever he was arrested,’ the report read.