February 16, 2011
By Staff Reporter
Some Derry people cast a jaundiced eye on this sudden interest and asked why a public inquiry into a mass murder carried out at the hands of the forces of law and order had to wait so long to attract any attention, outside of that paid to it by the local reporters.
It is a good question with an obvious answer.
The importance of the inquiry is undeniable. But it has been running now for three years or more, during which time the only major “news” that it has generated is outrage in some quarters at the huge amounts of money the lawyers are making, bumping up the cost of the enquiry to around $150 million. The actual findings have been swamped by the three-year accumulation of detail. The story, in fact, has been effectively buried. Ironically, Bloody Sunday was more of a story before the enquiry than it has been since.
At the moment, we are waiting to see what the former Canadian Judge Peter Cory has said about the seven controversial murder cases he was asked to look into with a view to recommending whether or not any of them warrant a public enquiry. Those who have been pressing for a public enquiry into one or other of these cases should take a look at what has happened with the Saville hearings. The public’s interest in an important story has been more or less killed off by the endless, complex and painfully slow unwinding of the hearings. Only the relatives of the victims, the lawyers and a handful of individuals with a political agenda are left to lament the lack of attention the inquiry now receives — unless a big name is on the stand.