30 October 1997 Edition

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Mála Poist

Support for McAleese



A chairde,

As a young man in college I read the works of Frantz Fannon and Albert Memmi on the whole area of colonialism. Both men have described at some length the phenomenon in all societies which have had colonialism as part of their experience, of a section of people who, having decided to ``improve' themselves, see the world through the eyes of the coloniser.

They both say that these people further seek to put distance between themselves and their own people, to deny their humanity in the same way as their master.

If ever there was a classic example of this mindset it is the treatment which Mary McAleese has been subjected to recently.

The British state, in all its guises, attempted to deny those Irish people in the north of Ireland their nationality for seventy years. They failed. John Bruton, Derek Nally and their supporters are sadly mistaken if they think an Eoghan Harris-inspired hate campaign will be any more successful.

The neo-unionist agenda of those who for so long have wilfully misused terms like pluralism and inclusiveness has been laid bare.

Mary McAleese has learned at the cost of much hurt to her and her family the reality of what the pro-partitionist clique mean by ``openness''.

Mary McAleese will make a fine President if she is chosen by that section of the Irish people who have a vote. Her views on the situation in the North are amazingly dignified and free of bitterness given the pain her family have suffered at the hands of Unionism. In many ways she reminds me of that other ``Northener'' who ``interfered'' in affairs in this state, Gordon Wilson. How sad her work for peace had not got the same respect.

Enda Bermingham,
Dublin.

A chairde,

Before the smearing of Mary McAleese I was torn - If I had had a vote - between voting for her because as a northern candidate she matched the historical moment (although I considered her to be a careerist and an opportunist) or voting for Adi Roche.

However, now that some right-wing elements have shown that they are prepared to go to any lengths in pursuit of their political agenda, including treason and the subversion of the state they laughably claim to be defending, and in the process compromise SDLP members, I am no longer torn. Were I considered Irish enough and worthy enough to be allowed a vote in the Celtic Tiger Republic I would now consider it a point of principle and my duty as a democrat to confound the McCarthyite anti-democratic conspirators and give my first preference to Mary McAleese and would call on all true democrats, whatever their opinions, to do likewise. I would give my second preference to Adi Roche.

Joe Murphy,
Birmingham.

Medical assesment complaints



A chairde,

The medical assessment system referred to in Ann Marie Willis's article on Invalidity Benefit (2 October) is wholly inadequate, unjust and unfair. Because of this many sick people are being forced back to work.

The questionnaire used by the British Advisory Medical Service (BAMS) doctors is very limited indeed. How can a doctor, whose first duty must be to the patient, give a proper medical appraisal and determine the full extent of a person's incapacity if they are not allowed to ask in-depth exploratory questions? Assessments are supposed to last 30 minutes but many patients complain that theirs last only 5-15 minutes. There have been numerous complaints; doctors bullying patients and refusing to believe their statements, and humiliating and painful physical examinations. Claimants are advised to take a friend into the examination room to act as a witness.

The fear of being forced back to work is causing considerable distress and worry to one of the weakest, vulnerable sectors of society. How can the British government justify maintaining such a punitive, unfair system that discriminates against the sick and treats them like criminals?

Jeremy Williams,
England.

Open letter to Derek Nally



To Derek Nally, Presidential Candidate and founder member of Victim Support.

I would like the opportunity to refute allegations made by you on RTE Radio and TV about the shooting dead of Det. Garda Seamus Quaid by my husband Peter Rogers. You say you were a friend as well as a colleague of Garda Quaid, so why do you use the Evening Herald (14 October 1980) and the Echo and South Leinster Advertiser (17 October 1980) as your source? Both of them said, as you say, that Peter Rogers was involved in a bank robbery earlier that day and then shot the ``unarmed guard'' later that evening.

As a colleague you should know that Peter Rogers was not involved in any bank raid and that Det. Garda Quaid was armed and used all the ammunition in his pistol, wounding Peter Rogers.

I know that the bullet that killed Det. Quaid came from my husband's gun, but it was not fired in hatred or with vengeance. It was fired in the heat of a gun battle when both people feared for their lives. At the trial, evidence was given by the garda who was there that night that Det. Garda Quaid was armed, and by the three guards who arrived next on the scene, one of whom took the gun from Det. Garda Quaid's hand. Your commenting at this time on something that happened 17 years ago is hard to understand. Do you think it will get you more votes in your quest for the Presidency? If so, it denigrates the position you seek and demeans the work you did for victim support; after all my son and I are innocent victims too.

I would like you to know that my husband has tried to apologise to the Quaid family and to Donal Lyttleton, the Detective who was there that night, but this, in your eyes, counts for nothing.

I've no doubt that the people of Wexford will see this as a cheap ploy by you to gain a few votes at the expense of both the Quaid family and mine.

Deirdre Rogers,
Wexford.

Death of Diarmuid O'Neill



A chairde,

Careful readers will remember that the hospital receiving Diarmuid O'Neill's corpse last year compared it to a ``pincushion''. Now the nation is told (about a man who, dead, cannot defend himself) that one ``Kilo'' fired on O'Neill because ``he feared for his life'' and then, still himself not fired upon, ``thought he had missed'' and so fired more shots.

Even on the police's own account, O'Neill had been wakened and blinded before dawn by their CS gas, was unarmed and in his bedclothes kneeling when the ever-so-threatened policemen, wearing gas masks and toting machine guns, riddled his body with lead. What kind of men are these who, wide awake, armed and masked, make a `pincushion' of an unarmed, suffocating, half-clad man blinded and on his knees? What training did these professionals lack to mistake whether, at close range, their first bullets had struck a man who had not returned fire? Why was O'Neill denied immediate medical treatment and dragged bleeding down the steps of the now famous picture of his bloody pavement in Hammersmith? Why was he not arrested out in the open in broad daylight?

Frustration arising from the difficulties of striking back at invisible, alleged terrorists may move us to excuse O'Neill's punishment as ``fair in war''. But that is hardly fitting in a nation which, having given the world the common law, would rightly describe such violence committed, say, in Central America, as that of a ``death squad''. Moreover, even in war, is it right to shoot the unarmed, gassed or not? But the image of war is wrong anyway, unless the government will return to IRA prisoners the POW status they had before Thatcher. If they are criminals and not soldiers, they ought to get trials before they are made pincushions in a nation ostensibly without a death penalty.

Thomas Hutchsion McFadden
Pembroke College
Oxford

An Phoblacht
44 Parnell Sq.
Dublin 1
Ireland