The controversial Orange Order parade will take place this morning for the first time in almost three decades, following a late-night court decision.
In what was described as an “unprecedented” sitting of the High Court in Belfast, judges upheld the Parades Commission’s decision to allow the march along Garvaghy Road.
However, thousands of protesters gathered in heavy rain shortly before the Protestant parade was due to start in Portadown.
The demonstrators joined hands and sang as they sought to prevent the march from proceeding. A loudspeaker warning told them they could be arrested for taking part in an unauthorised parade.
Large groups formed along Garvaghy Road in the hours before the parade’s scheduled 8am departure, with many people in the crowd wearing balaclavas.
Prime Minister Andy Burnham urged “calm on all sides”, warning that Northern Ireland had made “big gains” and that “we don’t want to see things go backwards”.
Armoured vehicles have been deployed, while police are carrying out checks on the main routes into Portadown.
According to the BBC, officers are handing drivers an information sheet stating: “You are entitled to disagree with the procession and to make your views known peacefully.
“The procession has been permitted by a determination of the Parades Commission. People taking part in it also have a right to do so peacefully and safely.”
Nationalists protest against the Orange Order parade ahead of the march in Portadown, Northern Ireland
The crowds, many of them wearing balaclavas, gathered in large groups along Garvaghy Road
Sinn Féin president Mary Lou McDonald and First Minister Michelle O’Neill were among the party figures who joined the protest.
Speaking to reporters, Ms O’Neill said: “There must be no march through this community. That is how we restore calm, that is how we restore confidence.”
She continued: “Why, after 28 years of determination to block a march down this road, did the Parades Commission think this was the right idea today? To bring this mess back onto this community.”
“I commend this community. We stand with this community and we will continue to stand with this community.”
Ms O’Neill said the revival of the Drumcree dispute “brings into question how this whole peace process works”.
Some protesters blocking Garvaghy Road on Sunday morning could be heard shouting: “Bring Stormont down.”
Asked whether she believed Stormont could collapse because of the Drumcree dispute, the First Minister replied: “I think that this brings into question how this whole peace process works.
“The progress of the last 28 years has been brought into question by the actions of the Orange Order and those within political unionism who want to drag us backwards. I think that brings into question what you heard here today.
“You heard the people’s views of Stormont. You heard their views on whether politics is working for them. We have heard that time and time again, including throughout the last 24 hours.”
‘What’s the point? What’s the point whenever people are going to railroad over their rights? Whenever they’re going to try to roll back in 28 years of progress?
‘But I can tell you what we’re about. We’re about the future. We’re about building on our peace and progress. We’re about not allowing people to bring us back.’
McDonald told reporters it was ‘madness’ that the Orange Order parade was going ahead.
She said: ‘This, in fact, is primitive treatment of any community in the year 2026. It is intolerable, and it will not be tolerated.
‘This is a dignified and united community, and they are absolutely determined that they and we will not be drawn back into the past.’
A small group of Orange Order members wearing traditional silk orange sashes and black bowler hats gathered at another part of the town, a picture posted on X by Democratic Unionist Party lawmaker Carla Lockhart, showed
Loud cheers erupted from the crowds on Garvaghy Road after being informed the Orange Order had left Drumcree.
The cheers were soon followed by chants of ‘Bring Stormont down’ from some of the protesters.
The march was finally given the go ahead at a hearing which concluded at 2.15am on Sunday after legal teams repeated their arguments over the contentious parade, which was a notorious flashpoint of the Troubles in the 90s.
Thousands of protesters gathered in the rain where they linked arms and sang songs in an attempt to block the parade
Protesters block Garvaghy Road after a late-night High Court ruling upheld the decision by the Parades Commission to permit the march
Breandán MacCionnaith, head of The Garvaghy Road Residents’ Coalition, speaks through a loudspeaker at the front line of the protest
A member of the Orange Order outside Drumcree Parochial Hall in Portadown
Armoured police vans block the road in Portadown, Northern Ireland
People block the Garvaghy Road, a Catholic enclave in the largely Protestant town of Portadown, on the day members of the Protestant Orange Order are expected to march through the area
The time-limited sitting beginning at 12.20am on Sunday was heard before Justice Michael Humphreys.
He acknowledged the ‘unusual if not unprecedented circumstances as it is now 1.45am, with a parade scheduled to begin in just over six hours’ time’.
Outlining his decision, Mr Justice Humphreys cited case law that as a public body the courts must respect its judgment and ‘their decisions will not be lightly interfered with’.
He said: ‘The picture painted here is of a public body which took evidence from the relevant sources, weighed up the key issues which were in play and arrived at a reasoned decision.
‘The jurisdiction to impugn (a) public body’s decision on that basis is necessarily limited to cases where no reasonable decision could arrive at that outcome and in my view, in this case that threshold has not been met.’
He added: ‘This court cannot substitute its own view or anyone else’s view for that of the commission.’
Northern Ireland’s most senior judge, Lady Chief Justice Siobhan Keegan, described the situation as ‘unprecedented’.
Justices Keegan and Humphreys joined Lady Justice Denise McBride in the Court of Appeal which, in the late hours of Saturday, upheld an appeal by Portadown Orangeman Alan Hynes to allow the march to go ahead.
The stand-off at Drumcree made headlines in the 1990s, with nationalist residents of the Garvaghy Road opposed to the parade passing through the area, leading to violent clashes for several summers and political tension necessitating a major security operation.
The Orange Order has unsuccessfully applied for more than a quarter of a century to complete its 1998 walk along its traditional route.
On Friday, the commission reversed its long-running determination, to the welcome of unionist parties and outrage of nationalist and republican parties.
On Saturday afternoon, Justice Patricia Smyth blocked the commission’s decision, saying the ‘long-running dispute has the potential to escalate’ across Northern Ireland.
Under the legal framework around parades in Northern Ireland, if the court simply passed an injunction against the Parades Commission ruling in relation to Drumcree, it would allow the Portadown District to carry out the parade without the restrictions outlined by the commission, because it was legally notified.
Justice Smyth passed an injunction pausing the effect of the Orange Order’s notification of the parade, which counsel for the Garvaghy residents had described as ‘novel’ and John Larkin KC, representing Mr Hynes, as ‘rewriting history’.
Protesters hold up a sign reading: ‘From Gaza to Garvaghy Road. Resist occupation and fascism’
Michelle O’Neill, First Minister of Northern Ireland (centre), and Sinn Féin President Mary Lou McDonald (right) speak to the media
McDonald speaks to residents in Garvaghy Road ahead of the Orange Order parade
The Orange Order then lodged an appeal, which was upheld, before the case was remitted to the High Court and heard again before a new judge.
Barrister Denise Kiley KC represented the residents of the largely nationalist Garvaghy Road, outlining their position that much remained unclear about the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI)’s threat assessment provided to the Parades Commission.
She said ‘nowhere’ in the PSNI’s contribution to the commission was there ‘any assessment of future risk’ and was ‘entirely directed to past risk’.
Emma McIlveen, junior counsel for Mr Hynes, argued the Orange Order ‘has gone to great lengths to engage on the ground in the community’.
Ms McIlveen also said it is an issue of the protection of minority rights, describing it as a ‘hecklers’ veto situation’ where ‘those that scream the loudest get what they want’.
Ms Kiley argued the imposition of the injunction ‘does not mean that this parade cannot proceed, it means it cannot proceed tomorrow’.
She added: ‘The only way to preserve the position for this applicant and to preserve the supervisory position of this court was to grant interim relief and it was granted as a last resort.’
Tony McGleenan KC, representing the Parades Commission, said the court’s move to ‘deem a notified parade unnotified’ was ‘entirely unprincipled’.
‘It’s not who threatens the most, it’s that there’s an assumption in favour of legal assembly,’ he said.
‘We cannot have every Parade Commission determination brought back into this court every week, that’s not how it is supposed to work.’
Justice Keegan earlier said ‘there is a major problem that the decision in this case was given after 2pm on a Friday afternoon.
‘This cannot happen again.’