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As
a result of coverage in some Sunday newspapers referring
to the recent gun attack on my son Kevin Perry, I
feel that a very imbalanced version of events is being
fed to the public and that this should be corrected
before innuendo becomes fact in the public mind.
Despite
malicious rumours fed to the press over the past eighteen
months by Sinn Fein councillor Eamon McConvey, my
son is not a member of the Continuity IRA; nor is
he a drug dealer, thief, joyrider, shoplifter, anti-social
element, member of Al Qaeda, or whatever else the
local councillor may, in his fevered imagination,
allege him to be. In addition to the smear campaign
against Kevin, other family members have been on the
receiving end of McConvey’s poison. My wife,
who has never as much as received a parking ticket
in her life, has also been subject to the venom of
this career politician. Up until now I have escaped
it. Neither he nor his colleagues have bothered to
lash out at me. But because I have been left with
no option but to speak out against the violence, thuggery
and verbal abuse my family have been subjected to,
I am sure that I shall now be fair game for them.
As one of this town’s prominent cowards, our
Sinn Fein councillor will no doubt be eager to skulk
in corners whispering in the ears of journalists.
Unfortunately, there are enough hacks in the local
media all to willing to listen and print anything
- why let the truth get in the way of a good story?
Throughout
the period of sustained slander we held our silence
and only spoke of it for
the first time in the online journal The Blanket.
We were directed there by friends after the media
all but ignored the attack on Kevin. After The
Blanket carried our story there was a flurry of
activity in last Sunday’s papers, for the most
part inaccurate.
One
newspaper report stated that a bullet had been sent
to a reporter in a local newspaper. The inference
was that my son was in some way involved in this incident.
However, our family have been assured by people at
the paper that they know there was no involvement
on the part of any member of my family. Ironically
it was also reported that my son Kevin had been shot
six times by the Provisional IRA in what has been
referred to as a mixed grill attack. My son was shot
five times - perhaps we now know what happened to
the sixth bullet.
Although
Sunday’s media were spreading the story that
the Provisional IRA came initially with the intention
of warning Kevin, it seems strange that they would
come equipped with firearms, hammers and a nail bar
- what sort of warning was that meant to convey other
than the one that he eventually met on the 19th of
December when he was dragged from his home, shot,
beaten with hammers and a nail bar?
It
is libellous the way that newspapers have been able
to label my son a member of the Continuity IRA. My
son is not a member of any IRA. As for this other
group, the Irish Republican Volunteers, who have been
mentioned in the papers, my son wants nothing to do
with them. He is not associated with them and they
do not represent him or his viewpoint.
I
often wonder why the unionists get so upset over the
question of arms not yet being beyond use. The unionists
must know that the arms of the Provisional IRA are
not there to be used against them. The only people
to be attacked by Provisional IRA guns are nationalists.
This is the clause that the British government is
happy to insert into any agreement that they reach
with Sinn Fein - put the guns beyond use except when
used against members of the nationalist community.
Kevin
is at present unable to speak for himself as he is
convalescing as a result of the injuries he received
at the hands of Sinn Fein’s army. We firmly believe
that it was not the local Provisional IRA that shot
my son. They strut around this town like hard men
but in fact are referred to locally as wood lice -
creatures who only crawled out of the wood work when
the ceasefires were called. Outsiders must have been
called in to do it. On the 1st of December, after I had
written to Connolly House and 19 days before my son
had been beaten and shot, two members of Sinn Fein
from Belfast and South Down came to my house to discuss
all these issues. Two hours later they left promising
to deal with the problems my family faced.
This
is the crucial question I want to ask Sinn Fein and
the IRA - are your guns now only to be used against
those republicans and others who disagree with you?
I want Sinn Fein to get in touch with me. They do
not need me to tell them my address. They have attacked
the house twice and as far as I am concerned they
were behind sending the PSNI to the house to have
it searched on two occasions. I have stood up with
no balaclava and confronted Sinn Fein. Can the party
have the courage to do likewise and confront me openly
and honestly minus their army and its threats and
tell me why my son was left in hospital over the Christmas
period and why my family has been subjected to a sustained
campaign of slander?
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