IAWM meeting - Making Shannon Warport an election issue

dublin | anti-war / imperialism | news report Wednesday May 16, 2007 06:09 by Seán Ryan

The meeting went ahead on Monday 14th May with about 30 in attendance. Only one politician showed up - Patricia McKenna of the Green Party.

I was at the meeting organised by the IAWM on Monday evening.

It was penned as an event where interested parties could put their points of view to politicians who had signed the IAWM pledge. This pledge said that the person who signed it would not go into a government that continued the practice of allowing Shannon airport be used as a staging point in the US’s war on innocents.

Unfortunately, only one of the politicians, who'd signed the pledge, showed up. Patricia McKenna had phoned earlier and had said that she’d be late. She arrived around 9.30pm. In the meantime an open discussion was held, with members of the IAWM informing the audience of around 30 about the pledge and who had signed it.

Mr. Ahern had passed the letter addressed directly to him, with a copy of the pledge, down to the Minister for Foreign Affairs, who in turn passed it onto his secretary to answer. Apparently, we are complying with a UN directive in making Shannon available to the UN approved slaughter, even though the Americans are not under UN command. In other words Bertie’s Team replied via a cynical cop out.

Most of the rest of those asked to sign the pledge had either not bothered to answer or else had answered in a non-committal way.

Seasoned activist Colm Roddy spoke of having written to Pat Rabbite amongst others on the issue of Shannon. Rabbite had responded in a manner that at first sounded promising - he wrote of Michael D. Higgins and his views, but he ended with a get-out clause - he said that there were other factors, economic factors, which required consideration.

The discussion at one point entered a ‘what if phase.’ What if a politician who’d signed the pledge broke their vow. It seems as if this had not been given a great deal of consideration by the IAWM, it was concluded only that it could be used to pressure politicians - whether a promise with a signature constituted a contract or not hadn’t been examined.

When Patricia McKenna showed, she was given a very brief recap of what had happened up until her arrival. She was then put to the mercy of the audience. Whilst remembering her very strong record with regard to anti-war activities, she was given a very thorough grilling by many, the IAWM’s Michael Y. and myself included. It must be remembered that Trevor Sargent, the leader of the Green Party, had earlier on in the day, while appearing on the Pat Kenny show, said that he would not make the Shannon Airport issue a condition of his party going into Government. He said that such things could be decided after the election. Although Patricia had not heard this interview, she reiterated the fact that she had signed the pledge and that she would be sticking to it. All in all, Patricia gave a very good account of herself.

Despite the fact that only one politician turned up, I think most people who that attended the meeting got something out of it and were happy that they’d come. I know I felt this way.

I shall upload the audio files of this meeting shortly.

Related links:
Event notice of the meeting: http://www.indymedia.ie/article/82493
Sargent on Kenny: Green Party's leader fudges opposition to Shannon warport - http://www.indymedia.ie/article/82552
Paul O'Toole meets and is lied to by Fine Gael's Ivor Callely: Campaigning on the (pre-agreed) 'issues' - http://www.indymedia.ie/article/82563