No, Sinn Féin members or politicians will not be prosecuted for
the Bobby Storey funeral, and Roselawn Crematorium was not taken over by the
IRA or Sinn Féin on the day of Bobby Storey’s cremation. These
revelations, for some anyhow, come after months of interviews and scrutiny from
the PSNI and independent investigations. However, something interesting
happened today – Arlene Foster called for the PSNI Chief Constable Simon Byrne
to resign over what she saw as his “untenable” position as head of
the PSNI.
With that in mind: was Simon Byrne’s position labelled “untenable” by
Arlene when a couple of thousand Rangers fans flooded the Shankill Road to
celebrate a league win, clearly breaching Covid regulations and there wasn’t a
PSNI officer to be seen on the ground? Was his position seen as
“untenable” by Arlene when days before the Bobby Storey funeral, a
large loyalist funeral marched its way up the Shankill Road with traffic being
stopped by the very same PSNI whose Chief Constable’s position is now in
question? The answer is NO, in fact the loyalist funeral days before the
Storey funeral wasn’t even mentioned by the DUP and as far as I know hasn’t
been to date. As for the Rangers fans celebrating their team’s win, well
let’s just say they were given a very passive tap on the wrist by unionist
politicians, which was clearly for PR purposes rather than anything else.
The PSNI has taken action against a few people involved in that breach of Covid
regulations; however, political unionist voices were less than critical of the
jovial scenes on the Shankill Road that night.
Let’s not forget both Fianna Fail and Fine Gael got stuck in to Sinn Féin
too. There was so much condemnation of Sinn Féin and its supposed taking
over of Roselawn and the condemnation of the outpouring of love and respect for
a friend, leader, family man and comrade that some things got lost in the
furore. I remember the funeral of Detective Garda Colm Horkan, rest his
soul, who was shot dead in Castlrea, County Roscommon on June 17th in the line
of duty. Charlie Flanagan as well as Garda Commissioner Drew Harris both
attended the massive funeral, yet there was but a whisper from the high and
mighty about that breach of Covid regulations in the South. Charlie
Flanagan actually tweeted, and I quote – “Tell me who your friends are
& I’ll tell you who you are.” Bobby Storey, IRA hard man was
‘friend’ to Sinn Fein leadership North & South. Open display of
paramilitary trappings at Belfast funeral is a chilling reminder to all.”
Simon Byrne has refused to resign. Whether that is right or wrong is ultimately
on his conscience, but when radio hosts rabidly harass the subject, political
opponents of all hues, including so-called nationalists, unionist and
apparently neither, attack one political party, it’s membership and thousands
of supporters while ignoring very blatant occurrences of the very same thing
they are attacking a community for…one must also start to look at what those
parties stand to gain from attacking that one party, and a community grieving
the loss of a friend, leader, family man and comrade.
Comments are closed.