It is a historic day for Northern Ireland. After 28 years, the march of the Orange Order, a Protestant organization founded in the 18th century and strongly linked to the unionist tradition, returns to pass through the contested Garvaghy Road in Portadown. Their idea is to keep Northern Ireland within the United Kingdom but they clash with Irish nationalists, traditionally of the Catholic religion, who would instead like a united Ireland, with possible unification with the Republic of Ireland.
The clash between the two factions is a historic one and the Drumcree Parade, the Orange Order march, has become one of the most explosive symbols of the Northern Irish conflict. Everything revolves around one street, Garvaghy Road in Portadown, a predominantly Catholic and nationalist area. The route of the unionists, who have always organized commemorative marches accompanied by musical bands, banners and symbols of the British Protestant tradition, starts from the Protestant church of Drumcree and passes through Garvaghy Road.
The issue of the passage from Garvaghy Road is controversial: on one side there are the Orangemen who claim their traditional route passes through that public road; on the other there are the residents of the street, mainly nationalists, who do not accept that a unionist organization parades in front of their homes. The dispute exploded in the 1990s, in the most violent phase of the conflict that became known as the Troubles.
In 1995 and especially between 1996 and '98 there were enormous tensions surrounding the possibility of the Orangemen crossing Garvaghy Road: there were barricades, protests, clashes with the police and strong unionist mobilisation. The situation degenerated in 1998, when the Drumcree conflict became intertwined with the Good Friday Agreement, an agreement that sought to put an end to the most violent phase of the Troubles.
The consequence of this most violent phase of clashes was the ban on the Orange Order from passing through Garvaghy Road: the Parades Commission, the independent body responsible for deciding on controversial marches in Northern Ireland, prevented unionists from passing through the predominantly Catholic road in 1998 and since then the issue has remained unresolved.
For this reason today, 27 September 2026, becomes a historic day: the Orange Order, 28 years after the last passage through Garvaghy Road, requested and obtained permission to pass through the road.
The Orange Order had initially asked to be able to implement a march of 60 people, without musical bands and described by the organization as a silent and non-triumphalistic procession. The Parades Commission did not entirely satisfy the Orangemen but eventually authorized a more limited version of the march: 35 people, without bands, at 8am, with the requirement to disband quickly and without supporters along the route.
The march was authorized after a series of last-minute appeals. Yesterday a judge at the High Court in Belfast temporarily blocked the march, warning that the dispute could escalate and inviting the parties to "step back from the edge of the precipice". Shortly before midnight, however, a three-judge Court of Appeals overturned the injunction, ruling that the first-instance judge had erred in law.
The judges' decision, however, was not welcomed kindly by the nationalists living in Garvaghy Road who organized a counter protest. Dozens of people stood in the middle of the street, making a human barricade or sitting in the middle of the road to block the passage of the unionist march.
The Prime Minister of Northern Ireland, Michelle O'Neill, a member of the republican party Sinn Fein, also condemned the court's decision which arrived during the night. "Our message tonight is clear. There is no going back. Not tomorrow. Not ever," O'Neill said, expressing support for the "right of residents of Garvaghy Road to protest against this unwanted sectarian march".
