Limerick Peace group at Paddies Parade

by Cat - MidWest Alliance against Military Aggression Tue Mar 18, 2003 12:44 mama.mail at email dot com

The Midwest Alliance against Military Aggression (MAMA), the Limerick Peace
group, successfully participated in the St. Patrick's Day parade in Limerick
city yesterday, the 17th March, as part of the Limerick for Change group.
The Youth against the War group also took part. The group assembled as
arranged on O' Connell Avenue. However, it was requested that we
re-assemble in the army barracks and so we complied-never realising that it
could be so easy for an anti-war group to annexe the barracks!!! After
moving us about the barracks for half an hour and with much checking of
clipboards and attempts to remove cameras from the group (but with no
attempt to remove video cameras from the eastern European band beside us!
Likewise, it was requested that we fold up our banner until it was time to
march-no other group were requested to do so and many other banners were
opened at the time), it was finally discovered that we should not be there
at all-we could have told them that!

So we re-assembled on O' Connell Avenue. The skies were blue, the sun shone
down, we sweltered in our face paint and waited for our turn, enjoying dance
music from the float behind as we waited for the signal. Eventually things
started moving and we danced and chanted our way down O' Connell Avenue in
our brightly coloured clothes with the MAMA banner held high. We were
delighted to hear spontaneous clapping and cheering coming from much of the
crowd as we passed, indicating that there is a strong undercurrent of
feeling against the war and against the laissez-faire attitude of our
government towards the situation in Iraq and in Shannon. Our second banner
"Blessed are the Peacemakers-Jail Bertie" got a lot of laughs. When we had
reached the grandstand, an alarm was sounded and the group performed a
"die-in" in from of the assembled dignitaries. The announcer introduced us
as a "poignant" and topical reminder of the situation in the Middle East.
The Die-in continued and certain members of the grandstand audience became
ill-at-ease. Eventually the announcer thanked us and the die-in
miraculously arose and continued on down O'Connell St., chanting "St.
Patrick says this war must cease, here we are, Paddies for Peace!", and "No
War, No Blood for Oil, No US warplanes on our soil."

Participants in the parade were invited to continue up to St. Johns Castle
for a reception, where we all received very welcome bottles of water. At
the castle, Soldiers were showing children how to operate machine guns. We
felt that it was highly inappropriate that guns were being portrayed as toys
to very young children so the peace group sat in front of the guns and
opened dialogue with the soldiers as to how inappropriate this was. One
soldier declared openly that it was part of a recruitment drive. To give an
indication of the age group involved, one small girl was too weak to pull
the trigger and seemed to be about 3 or 4. Complaints were made to the
organizers of the display, the organizers of the reception and to the head
of the civil defence in Dublin. The reception ended about an hour after we
got there. A lovely day for a parade!

Members of MAMA have called a press conference today at 12, to which all
the local political parties and local groups have been invited, at which the
position on the Iraq crisis and the lack of a second UN resolution will be
discussed.

MAMA meet at 7.30pm Tuesday nights in Halla íde, Thomas St.in Limerick.

by Lurker Tue Mar 18, 2003 11:53

I'd like to point out that it is an offence to take photographs in Military Installations, and it wasn't just this group that were asked not to.

by Damien Moran - Dublin Catholic Worker 'Pit-Stop Ploughshares' Mon Mar 17, 2003 21:46 dbamoran at hotmail dot com

Love, Peace, and Solidarity with the Limerick Peace Activists. Keep up the good work asnd keep the faith as the world once again faces genocide. Any regular vigils being held?

by Peace Paddy. Mon Mar 17, 2003 21:23

St. Patrick says this war must cease
Here we are Paddies for peace - good chant