Global gathering for Mayo famine walk

THIS coming Saturday (May 21) sees the annual Afri famine walk take place in Louisburgh.

The 17k road walk, attended by hundreds of people from across the world, will be led by acclaimed Palestinian poet and activist Rafeef Ziadah and former Dunnes Stores anti-apartheid striker Cathryn O’Reilly, among others.

There will also be a fundraising concert later that evening by music legend, former De Dannan member Mairtín O’Connor.

Started in 1988, the annual famine walk commemorates the event of March 30, 1849, when hundreds of starving famine victims were turned away from the local landlord's house at Delphi Lodge. Exhausted, weak and emaciated, many of them were blown into the water on their return to Louisburgh.

The walk follows in their footsteps, remembering the suffering and injustices of the past, while walking in solidarity with the struggles of today.

Speaking in advance of the walk, organiser and coordinator with peace and justice group Afri Joe Murray said: “Needless to say our 2016 walk is of particular significance given the commemoration year we are in. We will be remembering the struggles of our past and honouring the type of country that our ancestors dreamed of.

“We are also walking to acknowledge the huge injustices in Ireland and elsewhere in the world right now, the wars in Palestine and beyond, and the ongoing hunger in a world of plenty. The walk is also a very much a celebration of our strength as communities working for change.”

For walk leader Rafeef Ziadah, who is on a tour of Ireland at present, the walk has a special significance.

“I'll be walking to honour those who walked those roads during the famine, and for my own grandparents who were forced out of Palestine in 1948 when the state of Israel was created.”

The famine walk has been led in the past by figures like Nobel Laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Christy Moore, journalist John Pilger, Mathatma Gandhi’s grandson Arun Gandhi, actor Gabriel Byrne, Michael Davitt’s granddaughter Gráinne, and Kim Phuc, the Vietnamese woman who was pictured as a child in that iconic photo where she ran from a napalm attack.

The famine walk weekend will kick off on Friday afternoon with a Food Sovereignty Assembly in Westport Town Hall.

Registration in Louisburgh is at 12.45 p.m. next Saturday (€20 per adult participant).

More details are on www.afri.ie.