A RECENT article by Kevin Myers railed against what he called the Bloody Sunday "industry". Although it's sometimes hard to tell with Mr Myers, I believe his basic point was that the commemoration of Bloody Sunday has been hijacked by the republican movement.

The now traditional march on the Sunday nearest the anniversary of Bloody Sunday is, undoubtedly, the most obvious act of remembrance, but it is not the only way in which the horror of Bloody Sunday is commemorated.

Thousands of people were present that day and I am sure each one has in the past week - privately and in their own way - recalled the events of January 30th, 1972.

I remember the day vividly. It remains the most terrifying experience of my life - a day when I thought I was going to die. I was among the scores of people trapped at the back of Rossville Flats. I can still hear the shots, the screaming and the crying. I can still remember the fear I felt as I lay on the ground, too frightened to move and too frightened not to move. And I can still see, in my mind, the prostrate body of Barney McGuigan, dead on the ground in a pool of blood.

It was the first time I'd ever been so close to someone who had been killed.

Clearly, Bloody Sunday affected me. I was 18 - an impressionable teenager. I'd gone on the march with my brother, Donncha, and a number of friends. One of those friends, Gerry Donaghey, was shot dead.

Bloody Sunday affected us all. Of those friends who marched - apart from Gerry Donaghey - two were killed and nine others wound up in prison as a direct result of the consequences of January 30th, 1972, and the subsequent cover up by the British administration.

Bloody Sunday affected our whole community. Seven of those killed that day came from Creggan, where I lived; I knew several of them - William Nash, Michael Kelly and John Young, all of whom were about the same age as me. The wider effects can be gauged by looking at the streets of Creggan, the Bog and the Brandywell, where scores of young men and women were later imprisoned, or even died, as a consequence of that day's events.

THE pain of that day will never go away from the Bloody Sunday generation, the hurt could be eased if there were to be an acknowledgment that those killed and injured were innocent, an admission that the victims were murdered by the British army.

The blood spilt by Barney McGuigan was eventually washed away, but the stain left by Bloody Sunday and, more properly, the Widgery travesty, won't be removed so easily. I, and a whole generation like me, saw murder done on our streets. We witnessed the contortions afterwards as the state moved to cover up. I am reminded of a certain lady's words - "murder is murder is murder".

Twenty five years on, it is important that the truth about Bloody Sunday be established and acknowledged. There are deep wounds and divisions in our society as a result of the conflict of the last 27 years. Progress in establishing the truth about Bloody Sunday would significantly advance the process of reconciliation and help restore confidence in our beleaguered peace process.

Last year, I went to the Somme with a cross community group drawn from both sides of the Border. My presence was a personal gesture of reconciliation - an attempt to understand how the other community here felt and to try to empathise with them.

For me, Bloody Sunday is an issue which should unite all right thinking people, and especially the people of Derry.

Bloody Sunday affected me, my family, my friends and my community, very directly but it also should affect everyone who believes in the concepts of justice and truth, and respect for life.

Kevin Myers clearly perceives Bloody Sunday to be a republican commemoration now. That is a tragedy. Bloody Sunday was a criminal act, a savage attack on innocent people. Bloody Sunday was state sanctioned murder, followed by a whitewash. No one can condone that.

The conflict of the last 27 years has made it difficult for some people to admit the truth about Bloody Sunday. That is a pity. Bloody Sunday was an assault upon the very concept of justice - quite literally an attempt to get away with murder. What kind of society would tolerate such an affront? What kind of society would look the other way and let the killers go free?

It is time for the British government to acknowledge that it too has responsibilities to acknowledge the implications and consequences of its security actions on Bloody Sunday.

We should not allow those who are afraid of the truth to cloud the issue of Bloody Sunday or to denigrate the relatives and those who have attempted to secure the truth.

BLOODY Sunday, to me, is of immense importance, not only in securing justice for the victims and their families, but also an issue which requires recognition by the entire community within the city as part of the process of reconciliation and healing.

It should not be used by anyone as a party political issue or a divisive issue, but one where civil society - churches, businesses, trade unions, the community and voluntary sector, all political parties and groupings and the citizens of Derry and the island of Ireland as a whole - should unite in the interests of truth, justice, law and respect for life.

I believe the issues raised by Bloody Sunday are fundamental to any democracy; those who choose to make it a sectarian issue or claim it should be left in the past are not genuine democrats and are afraid to face the truth of what really happened.

Everyone who believes in truth and justice should unite to ease the burden of the relatives of those who died 25 years ago and help carry the load in demanding justice at last for the Bloody Sunday dead.