BY TONY HUNT
LONDON - The weakening of the props of British colonial rule in Northern Ireland was highlighted August 3 when one of the sectarian "loyal orders," the Apprentice Boys, concluded an agreement in Derry with the Bogside Residents' Group (BRG). Every year the Apprentice Boys organize a triumphalist march along the walls of the Bogside, a nationalist area in the city center, aimed at intimidating those who live there. The agreement will result in significant changes to the route of the Apprentice Boys Parade on the afternoon of August 8.

At the same time the British government's Parades Commission banned so-called "feeder parades" the same weekend by the Apprentice Boys down the nationalist Lower Ormeau road in Belfast and through the village of Dunloy. Sectarian marches through the villages of Bellaghy by the Apprentice Boys and through Roslea by the Royal Black Preceptory, another "loyal order," have been rerouted. In return, the BRG agreed to lift objections to a morning parade by the Apprentice Boys along the Derry City Walls, so long as certain restriction were observed, and to a parade to the city's war memorial. A protest planned by the resident group has now been canceled.

BRG leader Donncha Mac Niallais told the Militant he was "pleased" with the agreement and the fact that "feeder parades will not be forced through." It was a "step forward by the Apprentice Boys," he told the BBC.

Mac Niallais pointed to the progress that has been made over the past few years. In 1995 the Apprentice Boys refused to talk to the Mayor of Derry, he said. That year residents mounted a sit-down protest on the city walls to block the sectarian marchers and were forcibly removed by the Royal Ulster Constabulary police force. Meanwhile, a sit-down protest by residents of the Lower Ormeau Road in Belfast was brutally attacked by the cops.

This year the Apprentice Boys decided to resolve the issue "through dialogue," Mac Niallais explained. Although they refused to meet the BRG directly, the loyalists engaged in negotiations through an intermediary. This was different to the Orange Order on the Garvaghy Road, in Portadown, Mac Niallais said. The negotiations had shown that the Apprentice Boys were having to accept "nationalists as equals and give people the respect they are due." He hoped that a further process of dialogue would begin in the coming months.  
 
 
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