Gluaiseacht members along with Shell to Sea campaigners, friends and British supporters took part in 3 different actions over the weekend of St Patrick in London. Here is a summary of their story!
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Having started at Ennis in County Clare at 11am on Friday the 14th picking up people along the way a full coach load of bewildered people arrived on Rampart street home of the The Rampart Social Center. It is soon to be evicted so we felt lucky to be there.
Having found a place to set up our various air beds and sleeping mats some put the head down for a few hours kip while most went out and about looking to do some site seeing, watch the rugby or catch up with friends or relations in London town.
The rest of the Day was made up of cooking food the masses and having planning meetings for the weekends actions.
THE ACTIONS
Having assembled at the given point on Sunday morning for our part in the Parade it was decided to keep our banners folded for the first few minutes until the parade got underway as he had received warning that organisers weren’t happy with protesters in their parade and may ask police to confiscate political banners.
After about 5 mins of walking we unveiled the banners and began singing songs and passing out leaflets to the crowds. We were well received for the most part and the songs streaming out from our many megaphones seemed to lift the crowd on what was a wet and cold london day.
Just as the parade was near its end police did indeed try to take out banners but we were too fast for them. The were quoting the new SOCPA laws which prevent any protest at all within a mile of any point around Westminster Parliament building.
We had heard that Enda kenny and John Gormley were to make speeches at Ken Livingston’s St Patrick’s party in Trafalgar square later so we headed on up there. As we arrived Mr Gormley was making his speech. We were unable to get near to the stage so instead unveiled ours pipeline and banners at the top end of the square and some members of our group spoke on the mega phone to the assembled crowd about why they were there.
Wet but satisfied we made our way back home to the Rampart.
The SHELL HQ
The following morning we headed over to Waterloo home of Shell in London. The pipe was unwrapped again and presented at the Door of Shell by representatives of the different sections within our group. John from Mayo protesting the coercion of the local community, Bro Anthony from Limerick protesting the Robbery Irish natural resources and Laura from Italy protesting Shells record of crimes and against humanity and the environment world wide. Despite calls for a representative to receive the pipe om Shells behalf none were forthcoming. Then the party started and musicians and mobile sound system cranked out the tunes and the crowd danced Irish jigs outside the building. This helped to keep us warm and our spirits up.
Watch RTE footage here http://www.rte.ie/news/2008/0317/corrib.html
The SHELL INVESTORS MEETING
This meeting was one for Shell to sell themselves to potential investors. We decided to remind these investors that it would be unwise to receive stolen property or to become accessories to worldwide human and environmental degradation. With this in mind we went off to The London Tower bridge hotel where the meeting was to take place. The group repeated the earlier performance of music and dancing while parading the pipeline out side the hotel and around the assembled police. Having found the conference room where the meeting was taking place members of the group advised any potential investors of the record of shell worldwide and asked police to arrest those inside for there murderous activities.
With that we all piled onto the bus again to head for home exhausted but exhilarated at the same time.
http://www.gluaiseacht.ie
http://www.corribsos.com/
http://www.mayogasinfo.com/faq.html
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old street shell garage evening of 17th march
Members of Rhythms of Resistance Samba band visited Shell’s old street petrol station around 8pm on the evening of 17th March to spread information about the pipeline to passers by and drivers visiting the petrol station.
We decided not to actually block the entrance/exit but instead to play on the forecourt (lovely accoustics!).
On arrival we noticed a tanker on the forecourt filling up the pumps. As he atemped to leave we decided to sand in front of his lorry and stop him leaving, and gave him a flyer explaining why we were present.
Several times the irate driver moved his vehicle forward attaempting to squash/scare those people standing in front of the lorry.
Eventually when he failed in running us over he decided to make a phone call instead,(we presumed to the police), and at this point we moved away from in front of the lorry but he just continued to sit there.
At this point we decided to leave before the police arrived and return once he had left and the police had been and gone.
On our return some 20 minuites later we again went onto the forecourt and commenced drumming, but this time two police appeared within some minuites.
We were asked to move to the pavement and complied, all the time drumming.
Soon the police returned from their car again and asked us if we’d promise to not go back onto the forecourt so they could leave and deal with 5 robberies!?
We said yes, of course.
So they left.
We continued for a while longer, witnessing a ‘biodiesel’ taxi enter the forecourt and fill up with regular diesel.
On talking to the driver he told me ‘you gotta put diesel in it and there’s nowhere to buy biodiesel’ and when i said ‘so the fact it says on the side “run on biodiesel” is a lie then?’ he replied “yes’.
Shell Sells Suicide
Some words:
there’s a bird dressed in black
there’s a world nearly cracked
there is me, there is you
what the hell shall we do?
it’s not hard to explain
all the ways we can gain
from a world without oil
no more spills, no more spoils
Shell smells sweet gas off the seashore in Mayo
they think it’s theirs just ‘cos the government says so
but they forgot about the will of the people
and the people of Mayo say ‘No, no, no, no, no, no, no –
it’s Shell that’s got to go!’
Shell sells suicide on the forecourt
Shell sells suicide
Shell sells suicide with such forethought
or
Shell smells sweet gas over in Rossport
or
Shell smells sweet oil in Port Harcourt
Shells sells ecocide
Shell buys South Bank silence completely
Shell sells wild lies
Shell kills wildlife and still smiles so sweetly
Shell kills wildlife (and somewhere the future quietly dies…or is reborn?)
here’s a bird dressed in black
there’s a world nearly cracked
there is me, there is you
what the hell shall we do?
– can we start anew?
– say farewell to Shell
– say no to oil etc.
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From an anonymous tipoff call very early in the morning two Shell service stations were found to have been D-locked and shut down for several hours on the morning of Monday 17 March 2008.
To coincide with the Shell Day of Action and visiting members of the Shell To Sea campaign from County Mayo, Ireland, although no connection apart from solidarity, some activists took it upon themselves to shut down two of Shell’s garages.
The service stations remained closed for several hours as frustrated staff used hack saws to remove the D-locks clamped around petrol pumps.
The Day of Action also saw Irish protestors deliver 20 metre pipeline to Shell HQ on Southbank London, and gave a lively protest.
Shell recently declared record profits for the second year running, the second time the corporation has broken all UK records for profit made by a British company, this year declaring £13.9 billion.
But the damage from this company continues to span the globe from County Mayo in Ireland, where the unfinished gas refinery construction has polluted the local water supply with high levels of aluminium, to the continuing ecological destruction of the Niger Delta, where death and disease from pollution and pipeline accidents has become a weekly occurance.