What was Paisley doing in Rebel County?

THE surprise expressed by Cobh “business chiefs” at the acceptance of an invitation to the Rev Ian Paisley to address the local chamber of commerce, and subsequent courtesy call on Cork City Hall, is matched by my surprise at the invitation being issued in the first instance (April 19).

What on earth is happening in the Rebel County? Recently, in a bizarre event in Carrigaline, the English 16th century warlord, slave trader and pirate Sir Francis Drake was commemorated by the unveiling of a monument in his honour. A government minister and a detachment of the Irish navy attended. It would appear we still have some distance to travel to expel the colonial gene.

To offer an invitation to Ian Paisley, the anti-Catholic, homophobic, racist bigot, just to drum up a bit of publicity for the upcoming 100th anniversary of the Titanic disaster is an affront to civilised society. This religious ogre stood by as a lumpen rabble of loyalism engaged in a campaign of random murder of Catholics for decades. This is the man who, in 1969, said of Catholics: “They breed like rabbits and multiply like vermin”. Ian Paisley has poisoned generations in Northern Ireland and polluted the name of Protestantism.