In
a
recent statement to the Derry Journal
the reactionary DUP politician Gregory Campbell,
on being asked if he would call on Sinn Fein to
report republican dissident activity to the police,
replied: "That will be a part of our test
for them after the Ard Fheis, we have a series
of things to put into practice to test them to
see if their support for policing means anything."
Mr
Campbell's statement is perfectly logical, as
it simply highlights the natural progression of
SF accepting the GFA and its addendum the SA agreement.
However, it becomes more sinister as Campbell
is well aware that many 'dissidents' have accepted
that armed struggle is no longer a viable option,
whilst defending the right of all oppressed people
to take up arms if their situation demands it.
The fact he and his party views in the same hostile
manner all of those who oppose the northern state-let
is not merely an oversight on his part, nor will
his insistence that SF stick rigidly to what he
and his British patrons regard as 'the rule of
law' be mere sabre- rattling, made to discomfort
SF in the run up to the elections.
This
is a very dangerous and backward looking development,
for what he in reality is saying, is that: 'anyone,
and I do mean anyone, who opposes the northern
state-let is beyond the pale, and thus a fair
target for the security forces, police and MI5'.
Indeed he goes even further when he demands of
SF that it instructs its members to tout on fellow
Republicans who have a differing political strategy
and outlook from their own, at pain of being punished
politically if they refuse to do so.
This
was always going to be on the cards. It is not
an exaggeration when 'dissidents' claim that partition
has been set in stone by SF signing the GF/SA
agreements. Was not the aforementioned the raison
det're of the northern state-let from its inception
until 1969 when the Republican insurgency began?
Although in those days it was expressed as 'a
Protestant state for a Protestant people', in
all fairness this is no longer so; what the north
has become is like any other part of the United
Kingdom in the 21st century, Finchley for example.
In other words, via the GFA, partition and occupation
has been legitimized.
For
instance, the UK Prime Minister has made it pretty
clear to British Muslims that their loyalty to
the State will be judged on whether they support
the governments position on Iraq, Palestine and
Afghanistan, and the
police have actually arrested or frozen the bank
accounts of British Muslims who have refused to
do so. Blair has been greatly assisted in
making loyalty to the state the main criteria
to citizenship by the fact that one could not
get a cigarette paper between his own position
on Iraq, etc., and the main UK opposition party,
the Conservatives'; the same is true of course
on the UK State's Irish policy.
Gregory
Campbell's statement makes it clear that if the
proposed SF Ard Fheis accept the writ of the PSNI
and thus the entire apparatus of the UK justice
system, then SF will end up either turning on
their core working class power base by becoming
felon setters, or, if they do not, at some time
in the not to distant future the DUP will demand
of the British government that they either dismiss
the SF Ministers or collapse the Assembly Administration
(yet again).
Sadly,
if this occurs, rather than walking away from
this nonsensical so called peace process and reevaluating
its strategy, SF will in all probability return
to the conference table to be once again tied
up in endless negotiations and red tape, which
has from day one been the whole point of this
never ending, mockney peace process.
The
Rule of Whose Law?
Some
supporters and members of SF keep prattling on
about the need for the rule of law within the
nationalist communities within the north of Ireland,
as if the rule of law were some God-given sharia
type thing, which is drawn up without prejudice
and thus one is duty bound to support it. Those
who take this view seem to be oblivious as to
how the rest of the UK's citizens view and interact
with the police and this mystical 'rule of law'.
The
fact that the UK has the largest prison population
in Western Europe should forewarn one about just
how many people view the 'rule of law,' as well
as the attitude the Blair government takes towards
the working classes. Which basically amounts to,
if they walk and talk and do not tip their caps
to their betters, then they are up to no good,
and the best thing is to imprison them to be on
the safe side.
OK,
so I jest just a tad, but if one analyses the
type of crimes and the social class of the majority
of UK prison inmates, it really is impossible
not to be cynical as to what motivates those who
lock them away. If one doubts this, they should
consider that approx 30% of males under 30 in
the UK have a criminal conviction, almost one
in three; the overwhelming majority of whom come
from working class backgrounds.
Now
whilst the English aristocracy and the upper middle
classes had a compulsion at one time to steal
other people's countries and the natural resources
within them, and of late appear to have slipped
back into their recidivist ways, I doubt the average
English, Scottish or Welsh worker of today is
any more likely to be light fingered than the
majority of the world's people, nor do they take
more drugs or consume more alcohol than their
middle and upper class counterparts. Yet it is
their children when young adults who mainly inhabit
the UK's 'criminal' justice system in great numbers,
which hardly points to the system being impartial.
The more so if we also look at the ethnic backgrounds
of those who pass through this wretched 'criminal'
justice system.
Thus
one should not be surprised that in reality the
overwhelming majority of working class people
in the UK regard the police as a necessary evil,
and feel the less contact they have with them
the better. Many of the laws on the statute book
are regarded by them as either stupid or designed
to pillory the weak/economically-poor and protect
the strong/economically-rich, and it is difficult
to make a solid argument against this viewpoint.
Few
would regard burning DVDs or selling them along
with other counterfeit goods as a real crime;
the same goes for cigarettes and tobacco on which
UK tax has not been paid, not least because the
manufacturers have simply increased their exports
to France and Belgium to take up the short fall
in sales on UK High Streets. The attitude of people
to illegal drugs is interesting; few people under
40 feel they are committing an unforgivable offense
when they take these drugs, and most regard those
who sell narcotics as business people like any
others, except the profits, due to the risk, are
on a par with the banking and finance industry.
I
doubt many would turn in their local dealer unless
they had a personal grudge or he/she was making
a nuisance of themselves by selling publicly from
home or street. Why would they, as in many cases
they would be turning in someone from their own
families? (See 30% statistic)
There
is another reason why the police are held in such
contempt: they are so bloody useless and inefficient.
For example, Britain's largest, and supposedly
premier Constabulary, London's Metropolitan Police,
no longer send an officer along to the scene of
a burglary unless there are special circumstances
such as violence or the victim has political or
masonic pull. Incidentally, when one considers
the level of police incompetence, it is not difficult
to understand how the prisons are full of unfortunate
but troublesome souls who should be elsewhere
getting treatment for mental illnesses and drug/alcohol
addiction.
To
conclude, the law when push comes to shove serves
the best interest of the power elite within any
state; in a fully functioning democracy there
are of course beneficial overlaps which allows
the law to serve the interest of the people as
a whole. To suggest the north eastern statelet
falls into this category would be infantile, to
say the least.