Time for Community Action
The
evil trade in illicit drugs, together with the cost in terms of human misery
that goes with it, has reached unprecedented levels across the Province. Those
of us who genuinely want to bring this nefarious trafficking in human misery
to an end must face some hard facts.
One
of these facts is that paramilitary beatings and shootings will not solve
the problem. Many of those responsible for this evil trade are as well armed
as the paramilitaries themselves, and direct armed intervention will only
lead to a spiral of tit-for-tat killings and beatings. We cannot afford another
long war such as the one we have just come out of. More importantly we do
not have the moral right to expect members of paramilitary groups, or anyone
else, to take on a battle that is really ours.
Another
hard fact is the inability of the police, on their own, to deal with the situation.
There is a fear within many communities that dealers and others involved in
the drugs trade are being retained as 'protected informers' against paramilitary
groups and community politicians. If such fears are real rather than imagined
there will always be a problem within the police and other security forces
about priorities. One wonders why the same degree of surveillance and force
that was employed so enthusiastically against paramilitaries is not being
employed against the drug gangs. Is the silent systematic poisoning of our
children any less heinous than the terror of the bomb and the gun?
A
third hard fact is that if communities want to eradicate this evil trade from
their midst they will have to do it themselves. This is not a job to be passed
on to "the boys" or to be left to the police. The time for passing
the buck is over. The trade in illicit drugs is not primarily a paramilitary
problem nor is it primarily a police problem. It is a community problem, and
it demands an effective community response. If those people who are affected
most by the drugs trade refuse to act on our own behalf we have only ourselves
to blame for the increasing rise in the trade. This is not a call for people
to take the law into their own hands. It is a call for communities to exercise
the inalienable right of self preservation against an evil and malignant,
even satanic, force.
The
drugs trade is a lucrative trade. It pays big dividends. Those engaged in
this trade are not likely to be persuaded by moral arguments to give up the
source of their high incomes and luxurious living. If the terror of direct
action by anti-drug paramilitaries is not persuasive it is doubtful if moral
reasoning will be any more effective. The question that confronts society
is, how is the just struggle against the Warlords of the Drugs Trade to be
conducted? If the violence of paramilitary groups is not the answer and if
the police alone is not the answer, what persuasive force is left that the
community might usefully employ?
Part
of that answer lies, I believe, in a tightly organised campaign of silent
non-violent picketing of those involved in the drugs trade. The moral alternative
to violence is non-violent resistance. The picketing of trafficker's homes
and other properties being used to further the drugs trade has been tried
unsuccessfully on an ad hoc basis before. To be successful, picketing
needs to be properly co-ordinated by local communities on a twenty-four hour
basis with the intention of "picketing till they (the dealers) are rendered
ineffective".
If
it is legitimate for aggrieved workers to picket their workplace surely it
is legitimate for aggrieved residents to picket the workplace of drug dealers.�
Effective picket lines need to be established outside every property�
that is being used to further this evil trade. Even more effective
would be mobile picket lines that follow the dealers and their cohorts as
they attempt to ply their trade. If they can't trade they can't move their
stock and if they can't move their stock they can't earn. They become less
and less economically viable and less and less of their poison reaches our
children.
Such
non-violent action will only be successful if it is supported and resourced
by the whole community. Parents, Grandparents, Young People, Clergy, Teachers,
Community Leaders and political activists. Indeed it is time for our professional
classes to show leadership.
The
alternative that I have called for demands personal action, even personal
sacrifice, on the part of ordinary people. It demands leadership and co-ordination
from the clergy and other professional people, and it demands a firm commitment
to non-violence. The other alternative is an ever-increasing rise in the drugs
trade together with sporadic outbursts of violence between the drugs gangs
and members of paramilitary groups who decide to intervene on behalf of their
families or others. This is not a viable alternative.
As
I have already said, this is a community problem. Communities must make their
choice. You must make your choice.
(First
published in the North Belfast News)