NAMA-ED AND SHAMED

With the spectre of economic crash lurking, the Irish have been nervously eyeing the situations in countries like Greece and Romania, wondering if they will be next. Irish anti-capitalists however, are not about to sit back and wait patiently for the crisis to bite.

Tuesday (18th) saw the third protest in eight days as an “anti-capitalist” block of 200 people, pushed past police lines to join a thousand strong Right to Work demo taking place outside Anglo Irish Bank.

The protest followed a demonstration and roof top occupation of Anglo Irish on Saturday (15th) which was violently broken up by police. The Tuesday before (11th) also saw a Gardai attack as they enthusiastically cracked the heads of protesters trying to enter the Dail (the Irish parliament) car park, resulting in five arrests.

Protesters are up in arms over the Irish government’s bank bailout and the creation of the National Asset Management Agency (NAMA), which props up the market by swapping dodgy property development loans for government bonds.

The campaign has picked up pace since an occupation of the Anglo Irish building on April 24th – timed to coincide with the 94th anniversary of the Easter Uprising and the day in 1916 when the Proclamation of the Irish Republic laid out a vision of Irish society that guaranteed equality for all. Brian Leeson, chairperson of Irish socialist republican party éirígí said, “The time for polite debate has passed. We believe that the only way that NAMA, the bank bailout and the cutbacks can be defeated is through a campaign of mass civil disobedience.”

* See www.eirigi.org/index.htm