A £500,000 community development project in a Co Donegal Presbyterian church hall has been blocked by a small group of church members, who insist the hall must continue as a badminton club.
The Raphoe Economic Development Group, whose chairman is a Presbyterian and whose secretary is the local Presbyterian minister, plans to renovate and develop the rundown 19th century hall as a community resource centre.
It would include production units to develop food products such as cheeses, bread and meat products; offices for farm relief services, a cross Border body which provides stand ins for farmers wishing to take holidays or sick leave; and a plastic recycling initiative.
The International Fund for Ireland has pledged about £300,000 for the scheme, some £75,000 is coming from Forbairt, and Donegal County Council is contributing about £200,000 for related environmental work.
However, when the contractors arrived on Thursday two weeks ago, they found the front gate locked and chained and a small group of protesters with a slurry tanker blocking the rear entrance.
Last Tuesday week, about a dozen protesters were back with a number of cars and a slurry tanker parked across the gates. A spokesman for the group, Mr Addie Magee, said their opposition stemmed from fears that the Raphoe badminton club, most of whose members are Presbyterians and which has used the building since the 1950s, would not be able to continue using the renovated hall.
The group said its members were "determined to remain in occupation". Any attempt to evict them would be opposed.
The group is known to come from the more conservative tendency in local Presbytenanism, which is uneasy at the idea of a former Presbyterian church being turned over to economic and cross community uses.
However, the Presbyterian minister, the Rev Brian Brown, has said that all members of the congregation had been involved in a three stage consultation process in recent years, culminating in a vote in which 300 out of its 400 members had voted in favour of leasing the hall to the economic development group.
He stressed that the badminton club had been offered one of the six posts on the renovated hall's management committee; promised use of its facilities three nights a week; and first option other times not taken up by farming and training groups. Up to now it had refused this offer.
Mr Joe Magee, a member of the badminton club, countered that earlier this year it had offered the use of most of the hall for economic development uses, provided it could keep the upper hall for badminton.
Mr Brown said he would be meeting the protesters, most of whom come from the Magee family of farmers and garage owners, in the next few days. He hoped an agreement could be reached.