Resistance being planned in London, Dublin and Fermanagh as G8 draws nearer

The powers-that-be must have been so chuffed with themselves when they came up with their cunning game plan for this year’s G8 summit, hosted by the UK government.

By holding it near Enniskillen, in County Fermanagh, in the north of Ireland, they thought they would kill two birds with one stone - shrugging off those pesky protesters expected on the mainland and showing off to the world how they had got the six counties nicely pacified and under control.

But things haven’t exactly gone to plan. First there was the rioting by Union Flag-loving parts of the population, which made many locals wonder if taking on another security headache was the wisest course of action they could have come up with.

Then there were the reported threats to the summit from dissident republican groups who, unlike us unwashed anti-capitalist hordes over here, tend to be armed.

And now there has been a flurry of excitement in the run-up to the summit in which it appears that there will now be three centres of protest across an eight-day period and spanning two different states. Hardly the easy ride the G8 were hoping for!

An Alternative Dublin G8 group is getting organised, indignant that “with the arrogance that only an imperialist power could be capable of, the British government has decided to hold the summit in one of its colonies”.

Protests are also being organised for the remote rural venue on June 17 and 18. But even if you can’t make it across the water, before that there’s a big anti-G8 week of action lined up in London in the run-up to the summit, from June 10 to June 14, around the J11 Carnival Against Capitalism in central London on Tuesday June 11.

Says the Stop G8 network: “The corporations, banks, hedge funds, and billionaires looting our world have names and addresses. They are in the glass towers of the City, and behind unmarked doors in Mayfair and Knightsbridge. London is the money-laundering den of dictators, the playground of the super-rich. But London is our city too. A city of hope, resistance, and struggle.

“Capitalism is killing us. Unemployment, cuts, and the rise of fascism in the “West”. Poverty, colonialism, brutal exploitation in the “Third World”. War and famine for profit. Private prisons, police checks, CCTV to keep us scared and controlled. Life robbed of meaning and beauty, our dreams and our dignity for sale.

“Don’t ignore. Don’t wait. For our friends and loved ones, for our communities, for our planet, for everything they’re trying to take from us. The time is now. Let’s come together, and fight. One common struggle.”

Anyone who wants a piece of the action can get along to the next national planning meeting, being held in London on the weekend of Saturday and Sunday April 6 and 7 (venue tba, see network23.org/stopg8).

Unusually, the meeting on the Saturday is being aimed specifically at people who hate meetings! The call is going out for “artists, musicians, fly-posters, fundraisers, trouble makers, social media geeks, promoters, kitchen crew, rabble rousers and more” to get down there and get ready to do their thang.

network23.org/stopg8