Stakeholder

‘I thought we were past all of this’ said one Newry shopkeeper following the bomb at the Courthouse.  Within a few hours of the attack a group of young people had launched a Facebook page ‘I survived the Newry bombing of 2010.’ The residents in newly regenerated Canal, Sinclair and New Streets, frightened and outraged; were unlikely to be signatories to the Facebook page. As a former Chairman of the City Centre City Partnership I recognise the efforts which have gone into rejuvenating the inner city by businesses, retailers, residents and housing associations. Looking at the age profiles of the young people who have joined the Facebook page the bomb attack has something of a novelty factor; it does n’t for the rest of us

But just as surely as the Clanrye River runs through the City Centre; resilience runs through Newry. The City and people have survived years of unionist neglect and economic discrimination. They have endured the penury of high unemployment and an unwarranted war by the IRA which laid waste to what little optimism and opportunity that existed. Yet through it all and in no small part due to a fine tradition of local education and civic leadership; Newry came through its darkest days to retake its historical position as the hub of the Belfast to Dublin Economic corridor.

In 2008 the New York Times declared Newry to be the ‘hottest spot within the European Union’s open borders’. The ‘Newry effect’ became an economic term in the current recession meaning ‘bucking the trend’ and seems an appropriate adjective to describe the will of the City.

Political agitation through armed struggle is not something waged by mindless thugs as the past thirty years has so ably demonstrated. Terrorism is rarely mindless; it’s intended to terrorise, to scare and to intimidate. That the learning curve of its futility comes too late to many former terrorists is of little comfort to its victims.

In the past and notwithstanding the huge military presence; places like Newry, Omagh and Derry were soft targets in the IRA’s so called economic war. At times it felt that British securocrats and IRA leadership were at one in treading over the aspirations of local people. After all a restless people could be a resentful people but that was not to be Newry’s fate.

There was investment in the infrastructure of the built environment and education.  There was cohesion of common purpose forged amongst the business, voluntary and representative bodies. The campaign to achieve ‘city’ status was less about the title and more about sealing the success of Newry and living up to Dean Swift’s recognition of a ‘proud people’. In ‘Newry speak’ there is no such thing as going back.

Conor Murphy, the local MP is testimony to just how much has changed and it’s a welcome change. Mr Murphy’s call for people to co-operate with the police without fear of reprisal or terror chimes well with the sentiments of those who have spent the past twenty years building up the reputation of Newry as a place of opportunity and investment.

Therefore the recent bomb attack must be set in the context of the new political and community dispensation which gives no succour to the dissident Neanderthals whose objectives, if successful would pull down foundations of Newry’s economic renaissance. The terror tactics of the 1970’s & ‘80’s strengthened the resolve of the Newry community to create a better society for their children than the despair offered by cyclical violence and spiralling unemployment.  Newry’s message to the Dissidents- is that resolve has n’t gone away –you know!