February 16, 2011
By Staff Reporter
By Anne Cadwallader
BELFAST — More than 35,000 ordinary people stood shoulder-to-shoulder in pouring rain across Northern Ireland last week and demanded and end to sectarian violence, murder, threats and intimidation.
In Belfast, the rally was one of the largest the city has ever witnessed. The trade-union, cross-community, non-party-political protests were held following the Jan. 12 murder of Catholic postman Daniel McColgan, 20, the father of a 13-month-old daughter.
Meanwhile, the Police ombudsman, Nuala O’Loan, is investigating claims that a man found dead at the bottom of a cliff in north Belfast had earlier tried to give police evidence about McColgan’s murder.
The body of Stephen McCullough, believed to have loyalist views although not a member of the UDA, was found on Cave Hill on Jan. 16, three days after the murder. At the time the police said he may have slipped and fallen.
He had stopped at a roadblock on the Antrim Road the previous day. Arrested on suspicion of drunk driving, he told soldiers he wanted to speak to detectives about the murder.
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He was taken to a city center police station, about four miles from where the McColgan murder inquiry is based. McCullough left the police station before detectives could interview him about the UDA attack.
The Ombudsman’s office is called in routinely if anyone dies within 24 hours of being in custody. She will be investigating the circumstances of his arrest and custody, although whatever evidence he might have given has gone to the grave with him.
On Friday, thousands of people in Belfast, as well as Derry, Omagh, Enniskillen, Newry, Cookstown and other towns turned out to protest against McColgan’s murder and subsequent paramilitary threats, despite torrential rain, biting wind and bitter cold.
A resolution read out at each of the rallies called on paramilitary groups to disband. It expressed revulsion at any form of bigotry or sectarianism which has led to murder, violence or acts of intimidation.
The North’s first and deputy first ministers, David Trimble and Mark Durkan, were among the thousands of people who took part in the rally in Belfast. The only party not represented at City Hall was the DUP, whose two ministers said they were too busy to attend.
Schools, offices, shops and businesses closed at noon on Friday to enable tens of thousands to protest. Church leaders, the business community and relatives of victims of violence supported the rallies.
A face in the crowd in Belfast was Michael Brett, whose son Gavin was shot dead last July. He was a Protestant but his UDA killers mistook him for a Catholic.
“Gavin’s death and Daniel’s death make no sense at all,” Brett said. “It has to stop and it has to stop now. It’s time for this sectarianism to be finished and cut out of society. The bigots don’t have a voice anymore. It’s our turn to make a better place for everyone to live in.”
Union leaders praised the large turnout at the rallies. Peter Bunting of the ICTU, which coordinated the rallies, said they sent a strong message to paramilitary groups.
“I was particularly pleased [with the turnout] considering the appalling weather conditions,” he said. “I think anybody who was at that rally could only leave it enthused with the strength of will to combat sectarianism that we encounter in the future.”
Sinn Fein assembly member Gerry Kelly, one of the thousands of republicans who attended the rallies in Belfast and elsewhere, said: “It is a good thing whatever way you look at it. It certainly lets those people know that they have no support on either side of the community.”