SINN FÉIN’S HOUSING spokesperson Eoin Ó Broin has said he is concerned that potential newcomers may be deterred from entering politics due to abuse from some members of the public, after he was accosted at a bus stop in his constituency of Clondalkin in Co Dublin yesterday.
He made it clear that yesterday’s incident, during which he was approached by the man who filmed and subjected him to a barrage of aggressive and abusive insults and comments, has not had any effect on him personally.
“Water off a duck’s back,” he said of the comments, which included labelling him a “traitor”, a common accusation from far-right, anti-immigrant activists and agitators.
However, he is worried that this kind of behaviour could discourage people from minority communities, women and LGBTQI people from getting into politics.
“My real worry isn’t so much how it affects me,” he said, citing his 30 plus years in political activism and death threats he received as a politician in Belfast.
“I’m thick enough skinned and I’m long enough in the game that I can I can deal with anything like that. But I do think the increasing prevalence of that kind of very, very aggressive, almost threatening behavior really undermines the potential to get new people and different types of people into the electoral process.
“And that’s a real shame because we need ever greater diversity of people, an ever greater range of people, particularly people coming in.”
On X (Twitter), where the video was posted, a number of people responded positively and posted words of encouragement for the abuse, while others, including one Sinn Féin councillor praised Ó Broin for how he “kept his cool” and wondered what gardaí were doing about “these aggressive incidents”.
Ó Broin said that the man who confronted him does not represent the vast majority of people he meets on the street in Clondalkin, which has a number of accommodation centres for asylum seekers.
One of the accusations made in the video, in between strings of insults, was that Ó Broin and Sinn Féin are “bringing all these illegal migrants into the country, ruining the place.”
He said that incidents like the one yesterday, while it was a first for him, are becoming more common and generally share the theme of far-right, anti-immigrant sentiment.
He stressed that he often has robust discussions with constituents about immigration and other topics and that those conversations are usually reasonable.
“There are people who are very supportive of working with the international protection community, other people have more negative views, and then a lot of people in the middle who are just trying to understand what’s going on and see what impact it’s going to have on their community.”
Those engagements, he said, are “completely different, and a world apart from the very small number of people who clearly have adopted a far-right and very conspiratorial approach to these issues and they’re not interested in the conversation.”
“What they want to do is they want to spread fear, they want to spread hate, and you can see that there was no conversation to be had yesterday,” he said.
“He just wanted to hurl abuse, and then put it up on social media and that’s what he proceeded to do.”
He encouraged people who are understandably angry with the Government for various reasons to express their frustration in “a constructive way”.
“I just think the more opportunities people who feel left behind and feel let down by government can channel that anger in a constructive momentum for change, the better.”
Asked what politicians or the Gardaí can do to avoid or prevent these kinds of situations, Ó Broin said that the reality is very little can be done due to the nature of electoral politics and the need for candidates to be out and about canvassing.
He has been involved in training candidates ahead of the local and EU elections though and said there is advice for them about what to do in similar situations.
“So the advice first of all is is to protect yourself and to protect your canvas team because obviously you never know if one of these incidents goes from being verbally abusive to being physically abusive.
“The second thing is, if somebody wants to have a conversation and wants to discuss matters, absolutely discuss them, but if they don’t want to discuss matters then disengage, extract yourself from the situation.”
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