Protestors insulted to be called ‘lowest form of humanity.’
Dear Editor,
I would like to thank all who attended the anti-household charge demonstration outside Galway City Council on Monday January 9. It was empowering and a privilege to assemble with such a broad and diverse group of people from Galway, ranging from mothers with children, young adults, middle-aged couples and pensioners, people with disabilities, the working poor and the unemployed.
This is the active citizenship that our country needs for true democracy - to mandate our elected representatives. The aim was to hand-deliver letters to each councillor asking them to: amend the city budget so as not to include amounts projected to be collected from the household charge; to pass an emergency motion calling on the Government to rescind this charge; to support Galway home-owners boycotting the charge.
The letters were hand-delivered to three councillors and they had an opportunity to comment if they desired. None of the other councillors passed the crowd, so we entered City Hall.
Events henceforth were the making of the city councillors, the council officials, and the gardai. An appointed person was not allowed to go into the council chamber alone to deliver the letters, and the councillors refused to come out to collect them. After considerable time-wasting, Deputy Mayor Ollie Crowe agreed to accept and distribute the correspondence. Ollie Crowe even received a round of applause from some of those assembled!
To then hear the despicable comments made by the two Councillor Crowe brothers saddens and disgusts me. That I am called the “lowest form of humanity” by their ilk does not bother me, but it is deeply insulting to those brave people taking a stand against injustice in our society.
Something similar happened at the Galway County Council meeting and the "lowest form of humanity" was led by Crowe's deputy leader! It was their gang that got the country into the state it is in. Do they now think we - the people - should pay for the mistakes of Fianna Fail and their despicable pals from the galway tent?
I call on them both to issue an apology.
That sensationalist accounts were reported by some of the media present without gathering the facts is spurious. When challenged, certain on-line comments were removed (e.g.suggested attempts to hurl chairs at council members); however, I ask for written retractions too.
Are such comments and reports merely attempts to bring the campaign against the charges into disrepute, or to deter people from exercising their democratic right to peaceful protest? Either way, people will continue to fight against these unfair, undemocratic and unaffordable taxes – in Galway as elsewhere around the country.
Don’t Register, Don’t Pay!
Yours,
Dette Mc Loughlin
Galway family home buyer.
