Parade verdict due on next Drumcree flashpoint
Some relief over recent marches
By Noel McAdam
26 June 2006
The Parades Commission will issue its verdict on the Drumcree flashpoint march later this week, it was confirmed today.
Attention switched to the annual Garvaghy Road dispute in Portadown as relief spread in the aftermath of the peaceful weekend Whiterock parade.
Following a relatively low-key Tour of the North parade, including Ardoyne the previous weekend, hopes of a quiet marching season are rising.
But there has been no direct contact between Portadown district Orangemen and the Garvaghy Road Residents Coalition.
The new Commission, minus former Portadown Orangeman David Burrows who has agreed to take no part in Portadown decisions, will meet on Wednesday and issue its determination probably within 24 hours.
Nationalist, however, have warned that Whiterock, where a failed last-minute attempt at mediation between Orange leaders and residents led to a beefed-up police presence, must not become a template for other areas.
Orange spokesmen, however, said the principle of an Orange parade on the Springfield Road had now been established and should lead to a full parade next year.
Order Grand Secretary Drew Nelson said: “The peaceful outcome was entirely due, not to the Parades Commission, but to the efforts of the Orange Order and the wider community in the Greater Shankill area.”
DUP West Belfast Assembly member Diane Dodds said the future meant it had to be recognised that part of the Springfield Road must be shared. “It is the only way forward,” she said.
And Ulster Unionist leader Sir Reg Empey said the two successful parades were the result of courageous decisions to engage with residents, a more pragmatic approach from the Commission and sensitive policing - from which lessons should be learned.
Sinn Fein president Gerry Adams commended “the dignified and disciplined” response of the Springfield Road residents.
“The calm, thoughtful and courageous stand was in stark contrast to the disgraceful determination of the Parades Commission which was essentially a surrender to loyalist threats,” he said.
And West Belfast SDLP Assembly member Alex Attwood warned that despite the peaceful outcome it had been “a bad decision badly arrived at” by the Commission.
“We are no closer to an enduring settlement of the Whiterock issue, and we may be further away,” he said.
PSNI Chief Superintendents Gary White and David Boultwood urged both communities to continue to work together to ensure a peaceful marching season.
