By Grace Herbert - 20 June 2013
What an incredible, revitalising experience! On Saturday 15th June, myself and another member of Young Friends of the Earth arrived in Belfast for the “Big March for a Fairer World”. This was a march organised by civil society in Northern Ireland to protest the G8 Summit taking place in Fermanagh on the 17th and 18th June. For their part Friends of the Earth Northern Ireland had organised an anti-fracking element to the march.
As I arrived in Belfast that morning I was astounded by the number of police present around the city. In the days coming up to the march, you couldn’t turn on the radio without hearing theories about what might happen coming up to the G8 summit and everyone I met seemed to be expecting a riot. Walking through the city to the FoE office, while passing line after line of armoured police cars, it seemed the PSNI were in agreement.
When I finally found myself at the Friends of the Earth office however it was a different story. People had gathered there from all over Britain and Ireland to march peacefully to oppose Fracking, the energy of the place was enlivening and it was contagious. This event had been in the planning for weeks and everyone had brought large sheets of blue felt with their messages on it to be a part of a river for the march.
I was there as a steward and so before we left the office for the march, myself and the other stewards were brought away from the group for a few minutes to be directed on how the march should go, in the case of rioting etc. it wasn’t expected but it seemed Niall Bakewell from FoE was prepared for anything! We were handed packs with energy bars, an empty milk bottle and a ‘she-wee’ to use in the case of police ‘kettling’. Luckily there had been no need for this pack.
During the march we flowed through the streets with our make-shift river banner following our ‘Frack Pad’ with ‘No Fracking Way’ inscribed on it. We chanted chants like “They say frack here, we say frack off”. We danced, we laughed, we sang and we had fun, all while the Police starred and sometimes took pictures.
There was no riot, no drama. We stood together against fracking, we showed strength and solidarity and it was a beautiful experience.
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