Opposition politicians have called for an end to the protests at Dublin’s East Wall over the relocation of refugees to the area.
Some locals took to the streets over the weekend after the refugees were moved into a former BSE building on East Wall Road.
Labor Aodhán Ó Ríordáin said the protests must “stop immediately”, while People Before Profit TD Richard Boyd Barrett said while people’s concerns about the housing crisis were “justified”, they were not they should target refugees.
“These protests need to stop and need to stop immediately. We want to send our solidarity to those who are now located in that ESB building,” said Mr Ó Ríordáin, reports Independent.
He said independent advisers generally “stoke up whatever feeling they can for their own political advantage. There are many people who unfortunately only raise the issue of homelessness or housing when they hear that an asylum seeker may be housed. It is not good enough for the scenes we have witnessed in the past couple of days for people to take to the streets in such a manner,” he said, reports Independent.
Boyd Barrett urged them to attend a protest this Saturday in Dublin, organised by Raise the Roof.
“We want to make a special plea to people to not have their justified anger over the housing and homelessness crisis directed into the scapegoating of people who are fleeing war and looking for asylum,” reports Independent.
Sinn Féin, the Social Democrats, Labour, People Before Profit and independent TDs are leading the protest.
It must be pointed out that Sinn Fein appear to not know what side to be on in the East Wall debacle.
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