Locals in a sea side town in Co. Clare have ignored the local authority’s decision to remove of a mural of Che Guevara mural by replacing it with two new ones.



Last week Clare Council removed a mural of the Argentine Marxist revolutionary leader on the Alley Walls in Kilkee after American tourists complained. In response locals have painted two more murals on private properties ahead of the third annual Che do Bheatha festival, which celebrates Guevara’s visit to Kilkee in 1961.

According to the founding member of the Kilkee Chamber of Commerce, John Williams, the new murals came as a “a spontaneous reaction by local people to the high-handed way in which the council removed the mural”.

Williams told the Irish Examiner: “There isn’t anything organized about it. It is people showing their own frustration at what the council did. From talking to people,



”I would expect that there would be around six Che Guevara murals to be in place around Kilkee.”

He added that the erection of the new murals “is in the spirit of Che Guevara”.

The founder of the Che Do Bheatha festival, Tom Byrne said: “There was such a negative reaction to the Council’s heavy- handedness this year that it seemed inevitable that more such images have now appeared.”

The festival runs from 27-29 September in Kilkee.