Brendan Hoban: A few fanatics can create a lot of mayhem
Western People 28.11.2023
It was, as we say, the talk of the country. The Dublin riots took everyone by surprise and far and wide experts, real and self-appointed, stopped to analyse and adjudicate. In my circle, one man of few words (when asked for his opinion) kept repeating the word ‘Internment’, as if it should be immediately clear to everyone that the solution to such mayhem was obvious.
His quick fix was roundly rejected, as most of the assembled elders remembered the last time that solution was offered to the then troubles in the north of Ireland and which had the actual effect of extending the violence. Tempting though it appeared, interment didn’t get much purchase in the debate.
Nor did another fanciful suggestion – asking Taoiseach Leo Varadkar and Justice minister, Helen McEntee, to step aside and allow Sinn Féin leader, Mary Lou McDonald, as the Bonnie Tyler song goes, like ‘a white knight upon a fiery steed’ to ride to the rescue.
By way of explanation, this suggestion was based not on any particular expertise Mary Lou might bring to the task but to the vast experience she would be able to call on from the veterans of the Troubles who knew at first-hand how to escalate uproar in its various forms. It would, our expert encountered, also serve the effect of preparing said veterans (now being retired to the side-lines to make Sinn Féin more electable) to prepare for their expected membership of the Council of State when Sinn Féin win the upcoming election.
More seriously, it was suggested that riots in central Dublin might be a glorious opportunity for Fine Gael to flex its law and order muscles and deliver another term to the present coalition. A bonus was the graphic television footage capturing everything in colour as buses, Garda vehicles and even the Luas were torched as well as Gardaí being overwhelmed and assaulted by an angry mob. Resonances of memories of the television coverage of the Troubles in Belfast. But now in Dublin!
In any event, the government now has a promising opportunity to sort out in a few well-judged and well-resourced strokes both the Garda problem and the ongoing security needs of our city streets. After a series of crisis meetings, the three leaders may announce that Paschal Donohue and Michael McGrath will loosen the money-bags and bring policing resources in Ireland into the 21st century. Who knows, if the effort catches the public imagination, and the support for Sinn Féin correspondingly declines we might even have a snap general election way ahead of the present prediction of spring, 2025. Stranger things have happened. Even a single black Thursday can be ‘a long time in politics’.
The task facing the government is not insoluble. It seems that a few individuals known to the Gardaí are orchestrating the mayhem. They need to be nobbled and their influence neutralised. If the Gardaí are almost ready (as gossip has it) to swoop on the Kinahan gang, it seems (in policing terms) little more than a walk in the park to make life difficult if not impossible for the leaders of the tiny constituency represented by a few Far Right activists.
Part of it is allocating time and resources to converting the generous photographic evidence accumulated during the recent riots into useable evidence for prosecution. If this produces sufficient evidence against the leaders, well and good, though they may have been prudent enough to have kept out of sight but it will almost certainly help in achieving multiple, possibly hundreds of, prosecutions from an overall figure of an estimated 500 gung-ho people involved.
What seems clear is that for most of those involved, the riots afforded cover for an opportunity to cause trouble, to damage property, to attack the Gardaí and to ‘shop’ in Arnott’s and other prestigious outlets without having to pay. Or to blindly take out their grievances, real or imagined, at the behest of a few leaders who recognised the collateral promise of mayhem in the knife attack of an individual on three innocent and very young children and an adult creche worker.
The initial focus of the Gardaí was on the care, safety and security of the victims of the attack. Within minutes the relevant procedures were successfully in place and the relevant services had arrived. But once the story broke, it seems social media contrived to fill in the bits of the story that would unleash the misdirected mob that was quickly summoned to the vicinity. The attacker was a refugee from abroad (it was reported). The children were Irish (it was said). And whatever other embellishments were thought to infuriate a mob were quickly added.
Already, a few weeks ago, a part rehearsal had taken place outside Dáil Éireann with an orchestrated effort to bully anyone a small mob could finger, including TDs and private individuals, going about their own business. It was a window into what was thought possible but unlikely and that will now be used by other interested parties to milk the riots for their own purposes.
The facile wisdom now is everyone saw it coming but nobody was able to avert it. The more difficult truth is that no one saw it coming because no one really believed that a few Far Right extremists could unleash a yob mob of 500 that would in such a short time cause such damage.
The bottom line is that Ireland too can underestimate the influence of a few fundamentalist fanatics on the actions of those who lack the will or the ability to make choices for themselves.
It is a lesson we need to learn quickly.
My new book, Holding Out for a Hero/The Long Wait for Pope Francis, is now available at €18 in the usual outlets and online from
https://www.mayobooks.ie/Holding-Out-for-a-Hero-9780992902353?search=Brendan Hoban