24th June, Manchester: Gordon Brown Demo report

On 24th June 2007, the day of the coronation of the new Labour leader, Gordon Brown, around 2000 people got out on the streets to demonstrate against war. The march finished in Albert Square for the traditional rally.

A small group of people and sambistas sat in the street outside the conference / coronation venue, while the rest of the march passed by. The small spontaneous autonomous group was surrounded by police who penned them in. The police anounced that they would only let two people at a time to leave although they failed to give any formal warnings as to the reasons of keeping the group surrounded. The small group stayed there, chanting and playing music.

One man, outside the pen was arrested but later released.

The autonomous samba group, managed to leave the pen as a group and walked peacefully towards the main march. The Police, however, without any warnings or communication, aggressively pushed the tiny group of sambistas. One was brused, while a woman was arrested for no apparent reason. The woman will be in court later this week.

Is this what democracy looks like?

 http://youtube.com/watch?v=jJ9JfSwfHVw&mode=related&search=