“Adios! Amigo.” “‘The path to a new, better and possible world is not capitalism, the path is socialism.’ – Hugo Chavez” A board has gone up, on top of the Guernica mural on th International Wall, to commemorate the death of Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez, who died on March 5th, at age 58 (WP).
For the fortieth anniversary of their deaths (during 1972), five young volunteers from the lower Falls are remembered: Daniel McAreavey, Joseph McKinney, Jimmy Quigley, John Donaghy, Patrick Maguire (real name Patrick Pendleton). Maguire, McKinney and Donaghy died together in an explosion (Oct 10); Quigley (Sept 29) and McAreavey (Oct 6) were shot. For further details of the how these five met their deaths, see among others Lost Lives by McKittrick et al. (Archive.org | Amazon UK | US). Biographies of the five begin at 7m46s in this history of D Company.
“End sectarianism – it hasn’t gone away. Bring down the walls.” Workers Party (web) stencil on Northumberland Street, Belfast. “It hasn’t gone away” echoes Gerry Adams’s remark (Sunday 13 August, 1995) that the IRA “haven’t gone away”.
“End internment, 1971-2012. www.eırıgı.org.” Imprisonment without trial was introduced in Northern Ireland on August 9th, 1971. The return to prison of volunteers by having their license or bail revoked is considered internment by anti-Agreement republicans – see e.g. Release Marian Price or End Internment By Remand.
The events of March 1988 are remembered 25 years on: the IRA’s Seán Savage, Daniel McCann, Mairéad Farrell were killed by the SAS in Gibraltar on March 6th; Kevin McCracken (IRA) was killed by British solders in Turf Lodge on the night of March 14th, after the corpses had returned to Belfast; John Murray, Thomas McErlean, and Caoimhín Mac Brádaigh (IRA) were killed by Michael Stone on March 16th in Milltown cemetery at the burial of the three. (Two British soldiers, Derek Wood and David Howes, were killed at Mac Brádaigh’s funeral procession on March 19th.)
Events include a plaque to “women in struggle” in the Roddy’s and a murals in Twinbrook (X02322 | M09378) and on the “International Wall” Divis Street (X00979).
Competing Sinn Féin and IRSP Easter commemorations on the site of the former RUC barracks, and from éirígí in Beechmount Avenue, for Easter Monday.
“Belfast Easter Commemoration, Sunday 31st March. Assemble Beechmount Ave 1pm, parade leaves 1.30pm sharp. Speaker: Mary Lou McDonald, Vice President Sinn Féin/TD. Honour Ireland’s patriot dead – wear an Easter lily. Cumann Uaigheann na Laochra Gael – National Graves Association.”
“Shankill Star [flute band Fb] in memory of Brian Robinson”. A brand new piece (unveiled March 2, 2013) to Brian Robinson and/sponsored by the Shankill Star Flute Band, in Disraeli Street – where Robinson grew up – replete with images from the first World War such as soldiers (both British and German), trenches and poppies. Robinson was killed on 2 Sept., 1989 by an army undercover unit moments after he had shot and killed a Catholic named Patrick McKenna (WP). This is the second mural on the street to Robinson – see M08248. The piece is not paint, but printed boards, and the image has been generated by computer.
A board in the Bogside for “International Women’s Day, 8th March 2013 – Battling On: From petrol bombs to yarn bombs.” The woman in the painting – in the style of Banksy’s Flower Thrower (also imitated in Bundoran Banksy) – seems to have a petrol bomb rather than a yarn bomb.