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The echoes of the Twelfth remain, and especially those which
can be termed contentious.
For Orangemen, this was a highly enjoyable festival, rated
one of the most successful for years, and hopefully it will
pay dividends in the coming year, with a steady flow of new
recruits.
But the sense of resentment among many brethren remains,
and who can blame them? They only want to celebrate their
culture, giving offence to no-one, and surely it is not too
much to expect that their parades can take place without bitter
street opposition.
In the past 10 years or so, IRA-Sinn Fein has succeeded in
introducing a bitter element to Orange parades which didn't
exist before. It's a well-known fact that this was part of
their plan to destabilise Northern Ireland and to divide its
people.
Before all this, Orange parades were watched by many Roman
Catholics, and even in towns which had a largely nationalist
population there was a live-and-let-live approach to parades.
It's an issue which must be tackled and solved, if complete
normality is to be restored to all areas of the Province.
Sir Reg Empey, the new leader of the Ulster Unionist Party,
and Gregory Campbell, of the DUP, both stressed the need for
the parading issue to be settled once and for all, as an essential
part of any new Agreement in Northern Ireland.
It makes sense. Northern Ireland and its people deserve better
than this annual build-up of tension caused by republican
opposition to traditional Orange parades which has created
bitterness which hitherto did not exist.
It took years of planning for this policy of Sinn Fein- IRA
to be implemented, and it has produced a whole list of towns
and villages affected as well as parts of Belfast. And other
towns are being targeted by the republicans - Ballymena is
the latest- for confrontation at traditional parade routes.
This is a subject which deserves priority treatment by the
British Government, and by the Secretary of State and Northern
Ireland Office.
As Sir Reg Empey has stressed, parades must form part of
any general agreement for Northern Ireland. The Province cannot
afford this yearly build-up of tension - tension created by
republicans over artificially created parading issues.
There were nasty incidents at a number of venues this year,
and one of the most unpleasant was in Londonderry.
The city hosted a huge parade which passed off relatively
untroubled, the only serious incident coming in the closing
phase of the parade through the Diamond.
But the really vicious incident affected the return parade
of the Orange Lodge based in the Fountain area, the only remaining
Protestant enclave on the west bank.
This Lodge was returning to their base at the Memorial Hall,
headed by the William King Memorial Flute Band - a band named
in honour of a young Protestant murdered in 1969 at the very
start of the Troubles.
The Orangemen and band had to parade through a hate-filled
'tunnel' formed by republicans, who spat on the bandsmen and
shouted insults.
It was a tense and fearful experience for the Orangemen and
bandsmen, and one they should not have been expected to face.
The Orangemen and William King Band deserve better and every
effort must be made to prevent this in future years. It would
also help, of course, if republicans displayed toleration
towards people celebrating their culture, in their city.
It was especially sad that the attack on the William King
Memorial Band should have come on a day when Mr King's sister,
who now lives in England, was visiting her native city.
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