Merthyr’s March for Independence
An account of an afternoon in the ‘crucible of protest’
Saturday 7th September marked Wales’ third march for independence, the second I’d attended myself, and the first in the valleys of the south Wales coalfields. Having been born and raised twenty minutes and a mountain or two away, I confess that during the build up I felt as if I had something of a personal stake in its success; I was apprehensive.
The second march in Caernarfon had more than doubled the figure of the inaugural effort in the capital, and while the optimist in me wanted to continue the trend, the pessimist had other ideas. Independence has long been a political dream for many in the Welsh speaking heartlands of Gwynedd but the same is not necessarily true for Merthyr Tudful. For me to consider the day a success in terms of turnout I felt it had to surpass that of our capital city, back all those weeks ago when the less confident may have stayed away for fear of being the only ones to turn up (they needn’t have worried.)
I spoke with a friend who was also uneasy about the location of the march, uncomfortable with the idea that all of Merthyr’s passionate Welsh people would be imports for the day — he himself was from Aberystwyth. Was the march somehow imposing itself on a place that wasn’t willing to welcome it?
