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When
Micky Donnelly’s article
about Provisional republican ‘policing’
methods in Derry featured in The Blanket, it
was obvious that something was seriously wrong in
the North West. Donnelly, a former republican internee
and outspoken critic of current Sinn Fein strategy,
had some years earlier been attacked by the Provisional
IRA in his Derry home and sustained a broken leg and
other injuries in a blatant attempt to suppress his
critique. His wife and young children were also traumatised
by the attack. Had that incident been the only one
of its type it would have, like so many others, faded
in the public consciousness, the latter being subject
to a constant culling process which aims to obliterate
seditious thoughts that ‘are not helpful to the
peace process.’ But since the case of Joseph
McCloskey, so ably articulated and highlighted by
his mother Bridie, had failed to be suffocated by
the peace process, it was clear that more questions
needed to be asked about the nature of the relationship
between some elements in the general Provisional Republican
Movement and those communities in which it is situated.
I
don’t mind in the slightest not being helpful
to the peace process. A peaceful process rather than
the charade we have at present would be more appealing
and worthy of working towards. But there is no imaginable
reason why people should be disempowered through enforced
silence by a process which is so patently self-serving
for the increasingly prosperous republican political
class. So, one cold Monday morning accompanied by
a colleague and political activist I headed for Derry.
We expected to be there an hour and then, interviews
completed, on our way back along the Glenshane Pass
and home. Our wishes were to be foiled. Our homeward
journey across the Foyle bridge had still not commenced
by 10 in the evening - detained, as we were, by the
litany of complaints of abuse that we listened to.
Bridie
McCloskey was in fact our second interview of the
day. We had already been up to Donegal to speak with
a still incapacitated Danny McBrearty who managed
to move only with the greatest of discomfort as a
result of being attacked and shot a number of weeks
earlier. But Bridie’s story is one which sets
the scene because resulting from that Danny McBrearty
met his fate.
It
is hard to be unimpressed by Bridie. She had taken
her struggle for justice right into the den of Sinn
Fein. There would be no refuge for the party whether
in their local offices which Bridie and her grandchildren
stood outside protesting nor in Rathgael House where
the Minister of Education has his government office.
As she sat in the living room of her Derry home her
fighting spirit and resilience were infectious. She
rested on the floor, back against a chair and regaled
us with the details of how she reluctantly became
a figure of public interest. A woman consumed only
with getting through life with the minimum of fuss,
her concern for her family has led to her becoming
a relentless opponent of ‘thugs and gangsters.’
While not viewing herself as a human rights activist
per se her experience has left her feeling that the
greatest threat to human rights in Derry comes not
from the forces of the state but from those who were
once tasked with protecting nationalist communities
from human rights violations by the state.
Her
saga can be traced back to May of last year when her
son Joseph fell foul of some local republicans. He
was turning a pound to keep wolves away from the family
door by putting in the hours as a doorman in one of
the city’s bars - Jackie Mullen’s. His attitude
was one of ‘I work here to pay debts and feed
my family not to fight.’ One evening he was approached
by a young man seeking admittance. In accordance with
regulations and safety requirements Joseph explained
to the man that ‘the quota is reached and you
can’t get in.’ According to Bridie McCloskey
what happened next indicated the crude nepotism which
some seem to take for granted in the city. The affronted
youth stated that ‘I am the Education Minister’s
son.’ Joseph responded ‘that makes no difference.’
The man claiming to be the Education Minister’s
son then threatened get the Provisionals to deal with
Joseph. The latter paid no heed to him thinking he
was drunk and would remember none of it the following
morning. Whether the son of the Education Minister
or not the youth set in train a series of sinister
and violent events.
Joseph
had been in England for ten years and just recently
returned to his native city. He had a wife and six
children. He had no enemies within the Provisionals
or any reason to fall foul of the organisation. He
can think of no reason other than the dispute with
the man who claimed to be the son of the Education
Minister that would have acted as a catalyst for his
subsequent difficulties with the main republican body
in Derry. A month after this incident he was again
confronted on the premises by another man intent on
being abusive. After repeatedly warning the aggressor
to wind his neck in Joe had to physically expel the
man from the premises. The following day Joseph received
a phone call informing him to turn up at the Sinn
Fein office, which he did. There he met with Noel
McCartney of Community Restorative Justice, the O/C
of Greater Shantallow IRA, the local Sinn Fein councillor
Tony Hassan, and a Derry taxi driver who had witnessed
the fracas. Joseph’s side of the story was dismissed
and he was told that he could not work on the door
for a period of two weeks. This was rescinded almost
immediately after other door men went to Sinn Fein
to register a complaint.
Some
time later, while out with his brothers in the pub
Joseph, although not on duty, intervened to protect
a fellow door man who had been assaulted by someone
who allegedly was a volunteer in the IRA. Armed with
a black belt in judo it was no great difficulty for
Joseph to restrain the aggressive volunteer. A fight
developed and when one of Joseph’s brothers,
Paschal, made to intervene he was told by a member
of the IRA ‘do you know who you are talking to
big man? We can arrange to have you killed when ever
we are killing your brother’. Pachal McCloskey
then despatched the volunteer out the door with a
punch.
Matters
had barely settled down when the McCloskey brothers
received word that two cars manned with IRA volunteers
were on the way to the pub to sort them out. The brothers
departed for their homes. A few days later Joseph
went to England on family business. While there it
came to the attention of his mother that his house
was being monitored. A complaint was made to Noel
McCartney of CRJ who is reported to have said, ‘if
I was that young fella I’d stay in England. He’d
be safer there.’
Joseph,
on completing his business, returned to Derry. At
home one evening he received a call alerting him to
the fact that a team of IRA members were on the way
to his house to shoot him. When the attackers arrived
they tried to break their way into the house with
sledgehammers. One occupant in the house warned them
that ‘we are armed; can we discuss this tomorrow
in the Sinn Fein office in Cable Street?’ The
response was ‘we are the ‘RA open fucking
up.’ This was followed by shots from the people
trying to get into the house. Two people in the besieged
building returned fire hitting one of the people outside.
Fearing for his life Joseph fled to England where
he remained up until the threat against him was lifted
earlier this month. He is now home in Derry.
When
we met with his mother, Joseph was still in England
and Bridie had no idea if and when he would be allowed
to return. Relentlessly publicising his plight seemed
the only means of not letting the issue slip from
the public interest radar screen. Sitting in her living
room as her family nonchalantly milled past doing
one thing or another, I asked Bridie if she was a
republican. ‘I’m just what you see sitting
here.’ She explained how she had been very friendly
with many republicans and summed up her life as generally
being one of ‘live and let live.’ She continued
‘I was brought up being taught Irish songs and
to respect the Irish tradition. I was never brought
up to go out and kill anybody.’ In her own words,
her life’s philosophy existed in one sentence
‘if they don’t come near me and mine I won’t
bother them.’
According
to Bridie, since she took up her stand, Provisional
republicans have been employing a strategy of isolation
whereby rumour and innuendo have played a central
part. This has become a characteristic of Provisional
republicanism. Anybody who is remotely suspected of
harbouring the slightest admiration for Christopher
Hitchens’ United Front Against Bullshit is immediately
labelled as ‘bitter wee men and women’ suffering
from mental illness, alcoholism, sex addiction, egotism,
self-promotion, rejectionism - the slurs go on ad
infinitum to a point where nobody but the faithful
blind claim to believe them. And while some friends
are no longer there as a result of their own fears
a number of ex-prisoners have called to Bridie’s
home to offer her support and have reassured her that
there are republicans who are not happy with the manner
in which the defenders have become the attackers.
They praised her for continuing to highlight the issues
although they confessed to being afraid themselves.
Bridie says ‘in a round about way I have been
told to watch myself as I could be bumped off.’
Friends and other people who have known Bridie over
the years have called and expressed concerns for her
safety. Surely the Provisionals would not physically
attack her or put her life in danger? ‘There
is a real fear about how far these people will go
to settle scores. They don’t want you speaking
up. It is unbelievable that they can threaten you
with death for something as trivial as this.'
When
asked what measures she had taken to resolve the issue
Bridie was at her most voluble and fluent.
Mitchel
McLaughlin was on radio one day dodging questions
about our situation. He told the presenter that
he was willing to talk to me at anytime. I went
and waited outside that very same radio station
on him but he declined to come and see me. Only
after I sent word to him that I would not leave
Radio Foyle did he send word to me that he would
meet with me at Channel 9 TV but that I was to come
via the goods entrance.
McLaughin,
she claims, avoided her. Weeks later she confronted
him outside Woolworth’s and asked him ‘when
are you going to talk to me?’ In a curt response
that seems a bit inconsistent for a politician who
complained for years that unionists wouldn’t
talk to republicans, McLaughlin is said to have snapped
‘I don’t have to talk to anyone.’ Bridie
alleges that he went on to admonish her -‘you
have got up everybody’s nose including my own.’
His gripe was that the media were embarrassing the
party. And an aide of McLaughlin later informed Bridie
after one BBC Spotlight programme that nobody
would help her now as she had allowed the media to
use her. Eventually as a result of Bridie’s persistence,
Mitchel McLaughlin relented and agreed to a meeting
in Cable Street Sinn Fein office.
Before
the meeting took place Bridie was approached by the
party and asked who would be accompanying her to the
meeting. Bridie feared that there would be attempts
to entice Joseph to meetings so that he could be killed.
‘The same type of ruse was used with Frank Hegarty.
He turned up for one of their meetings and never came
back. This is their hallmark.' When the meeting did
take place McLaughlin allegedly insisted ‘none
of our men were there.’ He also asked her which
of her son’s party had the weapon. He further
wanted to know who had wired the family off that someone
was on the way to harm them. He then asked for the
names of everybody who was present in the house when
the shots were fired. His demeanour was described
as patronising. He had a - ‘and you thought they
were our men’ - attitude. He hinted that the
outcome of Joseph’s case would be determined
by the trial of the man who was shot and injured while
allegedly at the scene of the attack on the McCloskey
home. Bridie found the whole affair akin to an interrogation:
‘he was interrogating me but thought I was too
stupid to realise that he was interrogating me.’
The three main themes that McLaughlin returned to,
according to Bridie, were the names of those involved,
who had the weapons and who had informed Joe of the
impending attack.
‘When
I went to offer him the names of the Provisional IRA
members who carried out the attack he refused to take
them.’ He then introduced another person whom
he said would deal with the case from that point on.
The other guy said that enquiries would be made but
that it would take a while. After this meeting in
the Sinn Fein office Bridie felt that she and some
of her family and close friends were being followed
in cars. She returned to Sinn Fein and demanded that
this harassment through surveillance and tracking
cease. ‘I took all the car numbers and handed
them into Sinn Fein.’
In
a follow up meeting Danny McBrearty, an uncle of Joseph
and one of the men who had returned the fire of the
IRA, accompanied her to the Sinn Fein office. There
they met Councillor Tony Hassan who was accompanied
by another man. He said he could merely repeat what
McLaughlin had already said - that there was no exclusion
order.
I
asked could Martin McGuinness not talk to the IRA
on behalf of the family. Both men looked at each
other then laughed. I put it to them that he had
no problem talking to the IRA when it came to the
peace process. Hassan insisted that McGuinness could
not talk to the IRA. At this point I banged my hand
on the table and called them liars and told them
they had been sitting talking for the IRA for the
last twenty minutes. Danny offered them the names
and units of those involved. The two republicans
in the office grew furious and but for the table
between them and Danny, the man accompanying Tony
Hassan would have lunged for him. He shouted at
Danny ‘you shot an IRA man.’ At that point
Danny walked out protesting that he didn’t
have to take this.
According
to Bridie McCloskey and others that we spoke to in
Derry those involved in the attack on Joseph’s
house were all interrelated and it seems very much
to have been a family affair. A frequent expression
employed by those we spoke to was the 'three families'.
Sensing that it was being run like a dynasty I asked
Bridie was it more like the Sopranos than what she
expected the IRA to be. She smiled and said - ‘there
is enough trouble for me and mine without inviting
them back round to the house by agreeing to that.’
She did go on to point out that since the ceasefires
the IRA has gone on to become a law onto itself; its
attitude is ‘don’t do as we do, do as we
say.’
Bridie
and her son Joseph were in the House of Commons twice.
On one occasion a debate on the exiles took place.
Harry Barnes booked a room for Martin McGuinness and
Mitchel McLaughlin to meet with them but neither politician
showed up. McGuinness later promised Harry Robinson
that McLaughlin would be in touch with Barnes but
like so much else that Bridie has experienced, little
came of it. In a letter sent by the Derry MLA to Harry
Barnes he stated:
I
am aware of your interest in a number of cases involving
individuals who for many reasons have been excluded
from their communities . .. I recognise the unenviable
situation that these individuals find themselves
in but must point out that in many cases it was
brought about by the conscious actions of the individuals
themselves … After carrying out extensive enquiries
as promised, I informed Mrs McCloskey that I could
find no evidence of any expulsion order or death
threat issued by the IRA against her son, Joseph
McCloskey ... I see no reason to meet to specifically
discuss this case.
Harry
Barnes then wrote to Martin McGuinness. In an additional
letter to McGuinness in September, sent this time
by Joseph McCloskey, the following points were raised:
I
want to return home to Ireland. You are the only
person who can make this happen…You and I both
know you have the power to do it…when Danny
McBrearty gave you first hand details of what happened
you weren't prepared to do anything … Now it
is common knowledge everyone knows nothing is done
without the O/C’s consent. The O/C of for the
Greater Shantallow area was there (at the attack)
before he cleared off for his alibi.
At
the House of Commons debate Eddie McGrady was the
only nationalist MP to turn up but he proved useless,
holding whatever opinions he may have had on the matter
to himself. John Hume asked if Bridie would meet with
Sinn Fein president Gerry Adams in Shropshire which
she agreed to but nothing came of it. She remains
particularly scathing of the party. ‘They have
drifted in and out and have only been half hearted
in their support for us on this issue.’ Pat Ramsey
was the SDLP representative whom the family usually
dealt with. The most he could suggest was that they
do something through the statutory bodies but like
everything else the SDLP did it came to nothing. The
Catholic Church proved equally useless. Bishop Hegarty
listened to what Bridie had to say but responded that
he couldn’t get involved in politics. Bridie
noted this posture with a measure of irony. Pointing
out that it was a human rights issue she commented
that the bishop had little difficulty in supporting
the Colombian Three ... When it was put to her that
Denis Bradley of the new RUC board might be in a position
to help, her response was curt: 'when I needed Denis
Bradley he could not be got.' What about the position
of the Dublin Government?
Ahern
has so far ignored it. They are all worried about
their Good Friday Agreement. But sure the people
shouting loudest about saving the Good Friday Agreement
were the people who broke it when they launched
an armed attack on Joseph’s home. When Stormont
collapsed McGuinness appeared on TV to say how much
he was in favour of human rights. What respect for
human rights was shown at the home of Joseph? When
the Good Friday Agreement came in human rights for
nationalists in Derry went out.
Bridie
McCloskey's 'lack' of political nous - others would
say a lack of bias - may be seen in her warm attitude
towards some of those who have displayed a concern
with her case. 'The unionist MPs came up and praised
us for our work.' Gary Kent assisted her also and
she is effusive in her praise for former FAIT activist
Henry Robinson. He once accompanied her to the House
of Commons. But Sinn Fein would claim with some justification
that unionists and others are interested in the case
only in so far as it provides a chance to embarrass
republicanism as was demonstrated recently by their
appalling silence in the aftermath of the crucifixion
of Harry McCarten in Belfast’s Seymour Hill,
a medieval form of punishment carried out by the UFF.
When
it was put to Bridie that the CRJ may be able to help
her the response was one that suggested that CRJ for
her was more a case of Chucks’ Retribution Junta:
I
have no faith in the Community Restorative Justice
to resolve this issue. It was a member of CRJ who
started these problems. One member of CRJ was boasting
that he had sought the death penalty for Joseph.
Noel McCartney is director of elections for Sinn
Fein in the city. How can we trust CRJ to do any
thing when that sort of link exists? If CRJ is independent
why did Noel McCartney have to take Joseph to a
Sinn Fein office?
This
is a view shared by Joseph McCloskey. In a letter
sent to a local newspaper he complained that ‘Noel
McCartney is on TV and the papers saying about the
PSNI breaking down his brother’s door among others
but he never said anything when the IRA was breaking
down mine . …If the CRJ is not Sinn Fein/IRA
why was Noel McCartney doing his affairs in Sinn Fein
offices?'
As
a result of the persistent pressure applied by Bridie
including profiling her son’s case case in the
media, a man described as ‘a message boy for
the Provos’ came in a bid to cajole the family
into saying that the person injured in the attack
on the house was merely running after a taxi and was
not involved in anything illegal. The 'message boy'
said that the family would be best to seek the advice
of a solicitor as to how this should be worded.
For
Bridie McCloskey the issue is simple. 'The fact that
one of the republican hard men in the town got put
in his place by Joseph in the pub has caused them
embarrassment. The family pushing it are a key republican
family and one of them said ‘Joseph is never
getting back into town.' Adams and McGuinness are
claiming to be pushing for equality of treatment for
all nationalist citizens. What sort of equality are
they overseeing when this thuggery is allowed to go
on?'
Since
The Blanket interviewed Bridie McCloskey, her
son Joseph has been allowed to return to Derry. For
the time being it seems he is safe although he would
do well not to drop his guard. He is no hood or drug
dealer. He poses no threat to the social peace that
people crave in the face of much violent anti-social
activity. His 'crime' it seems is to have stood on
the toes of made-men who demand 'respect'. But respect,
unlike fear, is earned, not imposed. That we as a
republican community have to - in order to protect
the self image of the made-men - isolate working class
middle-aged women like Bridie McCloskey, engage in
evasiveness, stay silent in the face of self-serving
non-political violence aimed at social control is
the total negation of what our participation in this
struggle was all about. Is Bridie McCloskey not one
of the oppressed? Napoleon seemingly was not far off
the mark when he commented that 'amongst the oppressed
are those who like to oppress.' Our quiet complicity
in these matters leads to us being nothing other than
silent witnesses to the criminalisation of our republican
political culture by people who are where they are
largely as a result of others dying to ensure that
no such criminalisation would ever be imposed upon
us. While many members of the Provisional Republican
Movement are not the type described by Bridie McCloskey
there is clearly an element within Derry Provisionalism
- seemingly those who hegemonise it if what all our
interviewees claim is factual - who have both inverted
the ethos of republicanism and subverted its function
for their own ends. Have our efforts over the past
three decades been for little other than to produce
that situation Edmund Burke warned his readers of?
Those
who have been once intoxicated with power, and have
derived any kind of emolument from it, even though
but for one year, never can willingly abandon it.
They may be distressed in the midst of all their power;
but they will never look to anything but power for
their relief.
Capo
di Tutti i Capi?: The Three Families
Bridie
McCloskey • Danny
McBearty • The
Civil Rights Veterans
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