Portadown meetings reflect differing views on RUC
From IRISH TIMES December 5th, 1998
Members of the Patten Committee visited Portadown last night and held two
separate meetings to hear the views of local nationalist and loyalist communities
on the future of policing. More than 200 people were present in Ashgrove
Community Centre, on the nationalist Garvaghy Road, as Mr Chris Patten and
two other members of the commission heard submissions outlining the grievances
of local residents. Ms Diane Hamill, whose brother, Robert, was kicked to
death in Portadown town centre by loyalists in 1996, told the commission
that since her brother's death, both she and her family had been subjected
to constant harassment by the local RUC. Ms Hamill requested a private meeting
with Mr Patten and members of the Police Commission to discuss her brother's
murder in detail. Mr Patten agreed to meet the Hamill family. Cllr Breandan
Mac Cionnaith, spokesman of the Garvaghy Road residents, claimed that since
1995 the RUC had not acted impartially. He said that in general nationalists
in Portadown had no confidence in the RUC. He claimed there had been numerous
incidents of "collusion between the RUC and loyalist death squads". Later,
at Craigavon civic centre, Mr Patten and his colleagues faced an audience
made up mainly of unionists from Portadown and Lurgan. The majority of speakers
were supportive of the RUC, while a number claimed the commission was paying
too much attention to the "excessive complaints of the nationalist community".
Mr Patten rejected this. In general, the Craigavon audience said the changes
proposed by the SDLP and Sinn Féin would further exacerbate divisions in
Northern Ireland. Earlier, RUC widows called on Mr Patten to realise what
members of the force and their families had suffered. In Cookstown, Co Tyrone,
yesterday afternoon there was barely a raised voice at the public hearing
of the commission. The only occasion on which there were shouts from a section
of the 200-plus gathering was when a Sinn Féin speaker accused the RUC of
adopting a "shoot-to-kill" policy - which was "rubbish" according to some
unionists. The party's local councillor, Mr John McNamee, claimed that members
of the force had frequently fired plastic bullets at young nationalists
leaving the Glenavon Hotel. Among those making presentations during the
two-hour sitting were three members of the North's new Assembly - Mr William
Armstrong (UUP), Mr Denis Haughey (SDLP) and Mr Francie Molloy (Sinn Féin).
Calling for a new police force which would command the respect of all sections
of society, Mr Haughey said RUC officers had a unionist perspective. He
emphasised that the IRA acted for no one but themselves. Cllr William Larmour
(UUP) said it was an affront to natural justice for anyone to sit in judgment
on the RUC - which had suffered death and injury for the past 30 years without
complaint. The biggest applause went to a member of the audience, Mr Desmond
Gourley, who said: "What I want to be able to call it after this review
is `my police force' and for each one of us - from both sides of the community
- to be proud of it." |
