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Recent articles by Andrew Flood
It is now or we have to wait for a long time Apr 21 22 30 years Haringey Solidarity Group May 21 21 “Clap for Carers” but now they want our money as well Apr 13 20 Dublin: The eviction of the Occupy Dame Street camp ireland / britain |
community struggles |
news report
 Thursday March 08, 2012 22:19 by Andrew Flood - WSM
 Last of 2011's Occupy camps in Ireland, cleared - reportage and reflections
The small Garda team 'investigating' what happened at Anglo only includes one forensic accountant. As far as anyone can tell they have yet to get into the computers that were encrypted and which the bank has refused to hand over the passwords for. This certainly tells us whose interests those in power protect and that the Garda will ‘just follow orders’ even if they are individually included amongst the 99% of us who have been screwed over. Media coverage of the eviction suggests that it was a fairly low key affair with an overwhelming number of Garda (around 100) compared to campers (about 15) but commentary from the campers and a video interview published by the Irish Times suggests that a significant level of physical intimidation & force was used by Garda. Campers talked of pick axes being used to break into structures while they were still inside and of the seizure of mobile phones, lap tops, clothes, minutes & contact books and even bicycles that were chained on the square. This happened without warning, while people were sleeping. One of the campers said of the police that "they came like volatile bullies & terrorists .. they behaved like animals" Brief history The ODS project was always going to face significant difficulites. It arose as a semi-spontaneous gathering in reaction to Occupy Wall Street with very little advance organisation of any kind. This wasn't the first attempt at a camp style protest at the Central Bank, Real Democracy had a small gathering back in July which included a couple of token tents. But this time because of the coverage of Occupy Wall Street a couple of hundred people turned up. The gathering developed into a large speak-out but it was a couple of hours before the first tents were erected. It wasn't clear how the Garda would react to this but by nine in the evening no attempt had been made to clear the protest despite a dozen tents having been erected and an assembly of 150 people was in progress. The Garda strategy towards the camp turned out to be to tolerate it and in fact be quite co-operative at times towards dealing with external 'trouble'. The location of the camp meant there was a lot of this trouble in the early hours of the morning as its slap bang in the middle of the late pubs and night clubs section of the city. The camp decided to be co-operative with the Central Bank and not to obstruct the entrances to the bank with tents or other structures. So there was little in the way of day to day friction with either the police or the bank. Many of the camps elsewhere were forced to at least temporally overcome the inevitable differences that will arise when lots of random people come together because they needed to unite to defend their space from an external enemy. And in the process of such a defense bonds of solidarity between people with quite different outlooks are often created. In Dublin though the co-operation with the Garda and the bank left no such eviction crisis and external enemy to unite against. And there was a lot of distrust and paranoia about the organised left, not all of it undeserved. In the context of an increasingly inwards looking core camping group this left plenty of time to focus on differences within the camp and with potential allies. This, and a general lack of functional decision making mechanisms, made it impossible to develop ODS on a collective basis after the opening weeks. In the opening weeks of November this resulted in a series of fractious General Assemblies (GA) on the issue of whether or not ODS would take part in a march organised by the Dublin Council of Trade Unions. The fact that participation was blocked and the manner in which this happened meant that at the GA where the veto was deployed and in the ten of so days afterwards almost all the people with a collective approach and organisational experience walked away from ODS. General Assemblies seemed to have stopped happening from the start of December and apart from some odd stunts and a couple of protests the camp retreated behind its fortifications on Dame street. The Garda & Central Bank were probably hoping at this stage that the harsh winter weather would drive out the last campers but with the arrival of Spring they must have been concerned that the camp might be renewed. The annual Patricks day parade was thus deployed as the excuse for why the camp had to leave, with extensive coverage of this 'request' in the media to soften up public opinion. The camp at Occupy Dame Street last from October 2011 to March 2012, making it one of the longest running such camps in the world. Many, particularly in the US, were violently evicted, sometimes multiple times, before the end of 2011. But leaving aside longevity after the initial buzz Occupy Dame Street did not succeed, and was even counter productive on several levels. The best things to come from it were the projects set up by people initially involved when they departed. It's worth taking some time to consider what caused this failure and what the lessons are for the future. We intend to produce a detailed article next week where the WSM members who were involved in Occupy Dame Street will attempt to do just this. In the meantime the camp has called a General Assembly at the Central Bank for 6pm this evening to discuss 'where next.' WORDS & IMAGES: Andrew Flood
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HauptseiteSupport Sudanese anarchists in exile Joint Statement of European Anarchist Organizations International anarchist call for solidarity: Earthquake in Turkey, Syria and Kurdistan Elements of Anarchist Theory and Strategy 19 de Julio: Cuando el pueblo se levanta, escribe la historia International anarchist solidarity against Turkish state repression Declaración Anarquista Internacional por el Primero de Mayo, 2022 Le vieux monde opprime les femmes et les minorités de genre. Leur force le détruira ! Against Militarism and War: For self-organised struggle and social revolution Declaração anarquista internacional sobre a pandemia da Covid-19 Anarchist Theory and History in Global Perspective Capitalism, Anti-Capitalism and Popular Organisation [Booklet] Reflexiones sobre la situación de Afganistán South Africa: Historic rupture or warring brothers again? Death or Renewal: Is the Climate Crisis the Final Crisis? Gleichheit und Freiheit stehen nicht zur Debatte! Contre la guerre au Kurdistan irakien, contre la traîtrise du PDK Meurtre de Clément Méric : l’enjeu politique du procès en appel Ireland / Britain | Community struggles | News Report | en Sat 20 Apr, 00:57
This is a statement from some activists from Haringey Solidarity Croup express its support and solidarity to UK National Health Service (NHS) and other workers. In the meantime expresses its anger about that people been asked to pay the money to NHS while the health system is being suffered for almost two decades on the hands of the current government of conservative party and the former one of Labour. The demand is unreasonable while the UK is 3rd richest country in Europe and 6th richest country the world. The statement clarifies the current position of NHS and treatment of the government to NHS. Six men were on trial accused of falsely imprisoning the then Tanáiste (deputy Prime Minister) and Labour Party TD, Joan Burton, and her colleague in Jobstown, a working class suburb of Dublin, on 15 November 2014. The charge of false imprisonment carries a maximum sentence of life imprisonment. All six men claimed that they were exercising their right to protest, and that the protest was peaceful. This was part of a mass campaign that successfully defeated the attempt to introduce water charges. Following a nine week trial, the six have been found not guilty. The Irish government's attempt to introduce domestic water charges in Ireland is not going well. In fact, for them it's been a disaster because it's sparked off a huge upsurge in working class self organisation and direct action. Saturday saw thousands of anti-water charges campaigners flooding the streets of Dublin o to again voice their opposition to Irish Water & water charges and as a show of strength for the movement.
People in deprived areas in Northern Ireland are three times more likely to take their lives. Health minister Edwin Poots said, ‘Unemployment rates in deprived areas further affect people and this is a major concern. Studies indicate that a 1% increase in unemployment is met with a corresponding 0.79% increase in suicide. A huge secretive Garda security operation last night swung into operation in Dublin Port as Shell's Tunnel Boring Machine (TBM) left the port as part of a huge convoy of Garda vehicles. News of the operation had leaked at the last minute meaning that with only an hours notice a handful of Shell to Sea campaigners managed to get down to the port entrance despite the pouring rain. Most of us were pulled over and questioned by Garda at least once and the Garda helicopter stayed overhead as various Garda vehicles including a van load of riot cops with the door open drove past us repeatedly. In a new twist to the decade long struggle against Shell Rossport Solidarity Camp has revealed that Mayo County Council (MCC) has issued an eviction notice to the landowner of the field where the Rossport Solidarity Camp is located. Mayo farmer Gerry Burke has been threatened with fines of over €12,000 and two years in prison. Despite these theats the annual June Bank Holiday solidarity gathering will go ahead in a couple of weeks. Saturday's National Rally against the Household Tax in the National Stadium was literally filled to overflowing. As well as nearly 3,000 people crammed into every possible space in the Stadium another 4 to 500 were in the car park at the side, unable to fit into the building. And the thousands who attended were angry, energized and expectant of victory. The National Stadium normally hosts boxing marches but the atmosphere on Saturday topped that of watching a home fighter coming out on top in a close fought bout.
The end of February saw 19 Shell to Sea campaigners, including a WSM member, being prosecuted on 80 charges for civil disobediance against Shell's decade long attempt to impose an experimental high pressure raw gas pipeline on the communities of Erris. Over 8,000 euro in fines were handed down by this special sitting of the Belmullet court and Shell to Sea spokesperson Terence Conway was given two 3-month prison sentences under section 8 of the Public Order Act for blocking the road on two seperate occasions, a 'crime' that anyone following the struggle will be aware Shell's private security company committs three times a day with the co-operation of the Gardai. (Image: Community show support in advance of the court cases, J Bender, RSC)
Despite the opposition of the governing SInn Fein party, relatives of families of the victims of Bloody Sunday and political supporters, including Irish anarchists, marched in remembrance last Saturday. A report from the anarchists present and a background to the issues behind those determined to continue the annual commemoration. [Italiano] Mid-December saw the eventual publication of the long-threatened household tax legislation. The first three months of 2012 will present every household in Ireland with a choice: whether to succumb to this new home tax, which along with the proposed water tax will rise to approx €1,200 per annum within a couple of years, or to refuse to register, refuse to pay and make a stand against the costs of bailing out bankers and developers continuing to be hoisted on our shoulders. more >>
We can contact other local groups wherever they are and make our campaign bigger and nationwide. We can win the price war. Nowadays, organising ourselves and creating campaigns are much easier than thirty years ago during the poll tax era. New technology and social media platforms have given us more opportunities to call and contact people, whilst providing more and better skills to plan and organise.
The outraged media reaction to a jury doing its job and finding the Jobstown defendants not guilty is quite extraordinary. Rather than do the right thing and launch an investigation as to how 180 cops could produce evidence that was directly contradicted by video evidence, the media have gone on a rant against Twitter! Rather than finding it suspicious that nearly 3 million in public funds was spent by the DPP on a case that any proper check of available evidence should have indicated was never likely to convince a jury, the media suggest instead that the problem lay in the exact charges brought. The trial was part of a large scale state operation to suppress a mass anti-austerity community campaign.
The occupation of Apollo House in Dublin was the largest direct action in Ireland in recent years, but it did not materialize out of nowhere.
“The law is essentially the weapon of the privileged, it is made by them for the purpose of enshrining their power and the people need to dismantle it entirely if they want to be genuinely free” – Errico Malatesta
A housing direct action is took place this morning at the Dublin City Council (DCC) office in Bunratty Civic Centre, Coolock in Dublin. Mother’s and their children who are in need of housing occupied the offices in order to force the council to answer their questions. In particular they want to know why many people are discovering there isn’t even emergency accommodation available. more >>
30 years Haringey Solidarity Group: A Celebration of 30 years of radical ideas
On Wednesday The Barricade Inn Collective received court summons papers informing us that the following day (Thursday 22nd October) the estate holders of the building would be seeking an injunction against us. Court was adjourned and the case will be back in court next Wednesday (28th October).
The Workers Solidarity Movement has decided to withdraw from the Campaign Against Home and Water Taxes. Please see statement below. We have made a donation of €1,000 towards paying off the debts of CAHWT.
With the full backing of the Glasgow chapter of Liberty and Solidarity and local community newspaper 'The Burgh Angel' , Hamiltonhill Action Group will be holding a demonstration with the Scottish Tenants Organisation on Thursday 24th September, against the Glasgow Housing Association's (GHA) refusal to invest money in their community.
The second issue of 'The Libertarian' a local newsletter distributed in Dublin 8 by the WSM is online. more >> |
Als Anarkismo-Startseite festlegen
A large force of Garda and council workers were deployed at 3.30am today, International Women's Day, to clear Occupy Dame Street (ODS) camp. The camp was completely demolished in the course of the eviction, campers intimidated and their personal property stolen. This was a level of force way out of proportion with the numbers in the camp (about 15 people) and stands in contrast with the lack of resources put into investigating what happened at Anglo, the collapse of which has left a debt of 26,000 Euro on every single person in the country. 
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