By 
DERRY City and Strabane District Council members have condemned recent sectarian and racist graffiti incidents in the district.
At November’s council meeting DUP Alderman Keith Kerrigan made members aware of recent sectarian graffiti at a bus shelter, close to the Church of the Good Shepherd in Sion Mills.
Alderman Kerrigan said the incident was disappointing, as Sion Mills ‘has always been a very settled, mixed community’.
“There hasn’t been the issue, that there have been in other towns within the area in the past,” he said.
“There hasn’t been that tension. I would just call that we condemn this graffiti and that we work together as elected representatives, along with the community, clergy, PSNI, and other stakeholders to try and resolve these issues,” he added.
Sinn Féin councillor Antaine Ó Fearghail said sectarian graffiti ‘belongs nowhere’, while UUP alderman Derek Hussey said the graffiti was ‘disgusting’ and ‘does not reflect on the exemplary, cross-community nature of life in Sion Mills’.
People Before Profit councillor Shaun Harkin also condemned the graffiti and noted another incident in the Fountain on early Wednesday morning, November 26, in which racist graffiti was daubed on a Sudanese family’s house.
He added: “It said ‘locals only’ and I’ve spoken to long-term residents there; they’re very frustrated and angry about this [and] they don’t feel it represents how people in the Fountain feel.
“We’re in a context where people are being scapegoated by political representatives, very often in the Assembly
“We hear migrants blamed for the housing crisis [and] the hospital waiting list crisis, and then we have people taking actions into their own hands and targeting people who are completely innocent.
“People shouldn’t be getting treated like this, this type of racism has no place in our city.”
SDLP councillor Catherine McDaid said sectarian graffiti is ‘wrong no matter where it is’ and also condemned the racist graffiti in the Fountain.
“As Shaun has said there’s so many excuses being given [and] in Westminster we had the new legislation for the asylum seekers,” she noted.
“Basically they’re blaming the asylum seekers for everything. This is where this Labour government is at the minute.”
She continued: “It’s absolutely terrifying and it has given people a chance to come out of the shadows and show their racism.
“I think from this chamber we need to be really, really clear that anyone is welcome here in this city.
“This is the city of civil rights. We welcome the diversity. We welcome all other cultures.”
Independent councillor Gary Donnelly said graffiti has always been used to ‘get the message out’, but sectarian graffiti is ‘wrong’.
He added: “Regarding the graffiti in the Fountain, I don’t believe for a minute that that is representative of the people in the Fountain.
“I’ve been in the Fountain and it’s very, very diverse.
“Racism, sectarianism, it’s wrong, and I’m not sure if it’s just a matter of ritual condemnation; I think that there needs to be education.”
SDLP councillor Lilian Barr said she spent Wednesday morning with residents and community leaders in the Fountain, who were ‘very upset and angry at what has happened’.
“I know the family very well because they volunteer at the Northwest Migrants Forum, [they] are very good people [and] they are fully integrated in the Fountain.
“What happened does not represent the residents of the Fountain and the message from the Fountain area is that that family is welcome.
“I just want to appeal to the community, if they know anybody who have done what they did last night, to report it to the police or the community groups ,or even come to us, because it is unacceptable,” she concluded.
