A group of Irish anti-immigration protesters have picketed the home of an asylum seeker housing operator.
The national demonstrators, some in masks, used a loudhailer and held banners outside the home of the business owner, who runs a facility in Finglas, Dublin, on Sunday.
Anti-plantation activists said the rally was in opposition to attempts at demographic replacement in their towns, and said the housing operator had been trying to “plant the area for the past 18 months”.
The protesters use the term plantation to draw parallels between present day mass immigration into Ireland and historical attempts by the English Crown to override Irish identity and culture and replace its people via plantation schemes.
“They [asylum seekers] are economic migrants that have been encouraged to come here by the devout progressive leftists,” a protester can be heard saying in a video of the demonstration.
“It’s about money, it’s about profit … any empty unit will be filled with migrants – it’s about the plantation of Ireland. The endemically corrupt career politicians will fill this country with illegal immigrants from all over the world.
“We have the right to secure the future of our grandchildren. We are here to defend our communities and our country from the career politicians that have been bought and sold by the international bankers.”
The protest is the latest in a series of rallies, many held outside asylum seeker facilities, across Ireland in recent months, and one of about 500 anti-immigration protests since 2022.
Finglas was also the scene of a protest outside the local police station sparked by the alleged sexual assault of a woman by immigrants in February 2023. It was attended by 200 residents, and led to riot police closing the street.
In November 2023 a knife attack by an Algerian immigrant on three young children sparked anti-immigration protests in Dublin where hundreds of demonstrators clashed with police.
The government responded with draconian new hate speech laws.
Ireland accepted more than 140,000 immigrants in the year to April 2023 amid a shortfall of 250,000 homes, and according to the 2022 census 20% of the 5.1 million-strong population were born outside of Ireland.
Recent polls found immigration is now the third biggest issue among voters behind housing and cost of living, while 75% say Ireland is taking “too many” refugees, and 28% said they would consider supporting a party with “strong anti-immigration views”.
