ALMOST 7,000 people thronged the Garvaghy Road, Portadown, Co Armagh, yesterday at a rally to hear calls for an independent, international public inquiry into, the Drumcree stand off.
The platform was shared by the SDLP and Sinn Fein, who both condemned the RUC decision to allow the Orange parade to go down the Garvaghy Road on July 11th. Sinn Fein representatives and Belfast priest Father Joe McVeigh called for the disbandment of the RUC, while Garvaghy Road Residents' Coalition spokesman Mr Breandan Mac Cionnaith called for an independent international inquiry.
The mood of the crowd, the majority of whom were from Portadown, was described as "angry".
Ms Brid Rodgers of the SDLP said the people were there to express their "disgust". She said the blame for the serious implications and the consequences of what happened must be laid squarely on the shoulders of "the Orange Order and the unionist leaders who defied the law and, in the words of the Chief Constable, carried out a campaign of disruption planned on a scale that could paralyse the state," she said.
Ms Rodgers also blamed the British government "who capitulated to that campaign and to the threat of further violence".
"Violence or the threat of violence may deliver temporary perceptions of victory for one side or the other, but it does not and cannot resolve our problem", she said. "Nobody with whom I have spoken in the last two weeks wants to see a return to the nightmare of violence of the last 25 years. We must learn the lessons of Garvaghy and move on."
Mr Francie Molloy of Sinn Fein called on the RUC to "start to show leadership in your community, to start to negotiate with this community, to start to play your part in the community because the leadership that you are giving is driving these two communities apart. The leadership that you are giving is not the way to accommodation. The way to accommodation is by agreement by negotiation, not by intimidation."
Mr Mac Cionnaith told the crowd: "Your presence here today ensures that there will be no further marches along the Garvaghy Road without the consent of the people living here." Referring to Sir Patrick Mayhew's comments that he could not guarantee another Drumcree would not occur, Mr Mac Cionnaith said: "Well then, we will put this crowd on the streets next July."