Changed times on the hill in Portadown

Gerry Moriarty, Northern Editor, reflects on how an occasion which used to convulse the North at this time of year now passes off quietly

From 30,000 on the hill to 500 - that says it all about this year's Drumcree, the tenth year of this contentious parade.

Most people were thankful that yesterday was peaceful, but it was a peace hard bought.

Back in the very bad years - 1995 to 1998 - death, injury and destruction attended Drumcree. RUC constable Frankie O'Reilly lost his life from injuries sustained in a blast bomb attack in Portadown during a Drumcree protest. Lurgan Catholic Michael McGoldrick was murdered by Billy Wright's paramilitaries. There was the horror of the fire that claimed the lives of the three Quinn children in Ballymoney, Co Antrim.

Some days and nights you would have 30,000 people on Drumcree hill, Loyalist Volunteer Force leader Billy Wright with sidekick Mark "Swinger" Fulton (both dead now), menacing and cocky, keeping command; the police and British army hard pressed to prevent the hordes breaking through. That was the time when the Orange Order lost control of its own protest.

Remember too Johnny Adair (in jail now) turning up with his Ulster Freedom Fighters' colleagues in their "Simply the Best" UFF t-shirts - Adair's dog Rebel wearing one as well.

And the blast bombs, and the riots, and the rockets, and the sectarianism, and the hatred, and the fear and tension that gripped Portadown and Northern Ireland generally when Drumcree Sunday swung round. Northern Ireland still has the sectarianism and the hatred but it doesn't have the Drumcree of old.

Watching the 500 members of Portadown District parading by St John's Catholic Church at the head of Garvaghy Road yesterday morning on their way to Drumcree, one couldn't but feel that here was a sad, rather pathetic sight. Most years you would have scores of nationalists standing on the nationalist side of the barrier at St John's Church, quiet but grim-faced.

Towards the front of the nationalist group invariably was a young man wearing an Offaly green, white and yellow jersey. But he wasn't from Offaly; he was just employing the colours to make a political statement.

There was none of that yesterday - the jersey was kept in the wardrobe. The Garvaghy Coalition spokesman Breandán Mac Cionnaith asked nationalists to stay away yesterday. And they did. And there was an insult in their absence. They couldn't be bothered turning up because they feel they have won this battle. The fact that so few Orangemen and supporters attended Drumcree yesterday indicates that the Garvaghy nationalists are right.

The last time Orangemen finished their march by returning to Carleton Street in Portadown town centre via Garvaghy Road was in 1997. They were banned by the Parades Commission in 1998 and every year since then. Believe it or not, for more than 300 Sundays since then - aside from Drumcree Sundays - about half a dozen Orangemen march to Drumcree Bridge where, usually, one or two police officers inform them that they can't march on to Garvaghy Road.

It's a token protest. It will happen again next Sunday and probably every Sunday until Drumcree 2005. In the meantime the Parades Commission will continue its efforts to find a resolution to this dispute. And that can't happen until the Portadown District talks face-to-face with the Garvaghy residents. And even then there's no guarantee the Orangemen will walk the Garvaghy Road.

For the moment Portadown District talking directly to BreandáMac Cionnaith is a bridge too far, although spokesman David Jones says if sufficient trust were ever established it could happen - sometime.

The sign over the hut near Drumcree Church yesterday read, "Here We Stand, We Can Do No Other", but it was faded, just as the vigour of the Orangemen and their loyalist supporters is fading for this fight.