Jim Allister says he has ‘no apologies’ for the Alliance Party over his statement condemning effigies on loyalist Twelfth of July bonfire

TUV leader Jim Allister has said he owes no apologies to the Alliance Party over a statement he issued condemning the burning of effigies on a bonfire.

The pyre in question was in Glenfield, Carrickfergus, and featured three mock-ups of people hanging from nooses – one with the face of Alliance leader Naomi Long, one with the face of Michelle O’Neill, and another with the face of Mary Lou McDonald.

The whole thing also featured Irish tricolours and a Palestinian flag.

Alliance MLA Kellie Armstrong today took to the airwaves on the Nolan Show to reveal an e-mail exchange she had had with Mr Allister over the matter.

The reason she had made the exchange public, she said, was that whilst Mr Allister had spoken against such acts, he had done so “not unequivocally”.

A quote from Mr Allister, as part of the e-mail exchange with Ms Armstrong, was then read out on the show.

In it the TUV man said: “Such does nothing to aid any culture and of course only gives anti-loyalist forces like the Alliance party the opportunity to further demonise that culture; an opportunity which your party is ever eager to exploit with the sanctimonious superiority in which Alliance excels.”

“Isn’t that wonderful?” replied Ms Armstrong, with sarcasm.

“If it was any other country in the world the police would be going after them [the bonfire builders] for hate crime. This is not on. This is not normal. There are plenty of bonfires that can happen without this level of hatred.”

Mr Allister then issued a statement, saying: “As I made clear in my opening line to Kellie‘s email: ‘Burning effigies of living persons, as opposed to historic traitors or villains, is both wrong and offensive. It should play no part in cultural celebrations.’

“I have no apology to make for adding a factual point in the following paragraph to say: ‘Such does nothing to aid any culture and, of course, only gives anti-loyalist forces, like the Alliance Party, the opportunity to further demonise that culture; an opportunity which your party is ever eager to exploit with the sanctimonious superiority in which Alliance excels.’

“The attempt to link me to behaviour which I have called out as wrong and offensive because of an email in which I made those very points shows the disingenuousness of Kellie’s initial approach.

“As I made clear in my last email to her: ‘So it was about political point scoring for you!’

“My condemnation is unequivocal.”

Here is the full email exchange between the two MLAs – judge for yourself.

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Twelfth of July: WATCH Northern Ireland football flag and Union flag burned on the Falls Road to shout of ‘up the Ra’

UUP man condemns burning of Ulster Banner as part of campaign to ‘raise tension’ by republicans in south Co Down

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