Today, 1st July, the Rossport Five were back in court, charged with the crime of insisting on their Constitutional rights as Irish citizens. In contrast to their appearance on Wednesday and previously, a substantial crowd of supporters gathered outside. In just 48 hours, the outrageous actions of a High Court judge, throwing Irish citizens in jail for not complying with Compulsory Acquisition Orders which Shell has no Constitutional authority to issue in the first place, had thrust the actions of the present and previous Governments into the media spotlight.

From this point on, there is no refuge in self-deception: the Government and the Courts have shown themselves willing to treat the rights and the lives of Irish citizens with utter contempt, have shown themselves ready to give away countless billions worth of gas and oil, all property of the Irish people, to a British multinational whose behaviour across the world makes the Cosa Nostra look like a charitable foundation in comparison. Statoil has indicated by its involvement with Shell in this criminal venture that its upright veneer is sheer hypocrisy.

The issue involved is quite clear: the State has abandoned any pretence of loyalty to the Constitution. Henceforth, rights are to be stipulated or denied according to the political loyalties of judges, and Government legislation created to allow the State to do what it wants. This was of course already the time-honoured practice, but now that any pretence has been abandoned and war officially declared by the State against the Irish people, the traitors in power are digging in. No loyalty or obedience is owed to such people: the patriotic thing to do now is to treat their every utterance as a lie, and to broadcast their lies at every opportunity and by every means available.

Now the State even forgets, or no longer bothers, to disguise its oppression under the laughable rubric "democracy", when the reality is that these people are not democrats but fascists. With them, it has always been a matter of time and opportunity. More people will be thrown in jail by arbitrary decree as the present crisis deepens, but too late: the word is out, and things may get very bad indeed. It is to be hoped that the criminals in Government and the judiciary can be ejected along with Shell, Statoil, Coca-Cola and the other corporate criminals, their paymasters, before they resort to democracy El Salvador style. However, to tell from their present utterances and past behaviour, such is to be doubted.

© The Tara Foundation 2005