There is an old republican saying, which runs something like this: 'It is not those who inflict the most, but those who endure the most who shall be victorious.' That may have sounded apt at one time in Cork, even Havana or San Salvador, but not in the streets or cul de sacs of West Belfast today. The people who for 30 years endured loyalist death squads, Brit raids, shoot- to- kill by the RUC, now have to endure a new phenomenon: 'the social thug'.

People are now more frightened than they were at the height of the conflict, and they are left helpless despite two murders of members of this community in as many months and an attempted murder in the local cemetery. Some in the area are quick to respond when a republican is shot in the leg by a hood. But when ordinary people are murdered or tortured the republican silence is deafening. This epidemic has no boundaries. But it has to stop, it must stop, or we will have the Charles Bronson type figure evolving and handing out the type of justice the people are yearning for.

There is no quick fix, or is there? Maybe someone will conclude that a few bodies left lying in alleys, or a few families exiled might, just might, sort things out short-term, thus enabling a long-term solution to take root. Maybe someone who reads this has another solution. If so, we in West Belfast would like to hear it. Even if it is only to counter the culture where a mother can openly boast about how good a joyrider her son is, or a drunk can threaten to stab people (after a man was murdered in his home) then it must be worth a try.

So how much more must we endure to be 'victorious'? How much longer are the people going to be left helpless? There are many questions, very few answers. Maybe through the medium of this magazine we might get a few answers. Let's hope so, because if we don't, the future in the areas we live in is not pleasant to think about.

One time IRA prisoner G. Bradley who describes himself as 'a former republican - now a realist' expresses his fears that people in West Belfast are being abandoned in the new political climate.