Will a BREXIT mean not just signs but border checkpoints also?
The border region would experience a step-back in time if Britain chose to leave the EU.
That was the resounding summing up of the possibility of a BREXIT happening according to one leading businessman in Inishowen.
Francis Callaghan has been involved in many business ventures over the years, more often than not dealing with companies across the border in Northern Ireland on a regular basis.
The 53 year old, who now operates a mobile phone company, The Digital Fone Group, remembers well the days of border postings and having his vehicles searched.
The Buncrana-based businessman said a vote for BREXIT would be a disaster for the people of Donegal, the border counties and Ireland in general.
“Quite simply it would be a step-back in time. I remember well when we lived with th border along Donegal. If you visited Derry you had to pass between five different checkpoints between the Irish police, the British army, both sets of customs and what have you.
“I was involved in the furniture business back then and I remember having to fill in 30 pages of documents just to export or import some goods. Do we really want those days back again?” he asked.
Mr Callaghan said the problem with a possible BREXIT is that people simply do not know what it holds if it happens.
“It’s the entire uncertainty of it all. People have helped themselves to forget about the physical borders unless they have to remind themselves.
“They are just so happy and content to be able to do business without borders and not to have all this extra work that would certainly be entailed if BREXIT happened.
“Overall the real concern for business people if that we simply do not keno what will happen if Britain decides to leave the EU,” he said.
Local Sinn Fein Senator Padraig Mac Lochlainn says that for himself and for his party, there have always been a lot of reservations about the EU.
But he is emphatic that a vote for a BREXIT would lead to nothing but negative chapters in the future of local life in isolated Co Donegal.
“We have spent a long time undoing the damage done by partition. Yes, we have serious issues with the EU and the way we perceive Ireland was abandoned. As a people in Donegal we may not be happy with the type of European Union we have but we simply need to build more bridges and not to build a wall around us,” he said.
He points to many of the major cross-border projects including the building of a new cancer unit at Altnagelvin Hospital in Derry which will service thousand of patients in his native county as well as the development of the A5 motorway.
“A BREXIT would be the last thing we need. I do appreciate that the people of Donegal voted twice against the Lisbon Treaty and the people of Donegal are not in love with the European Union.
“We may want a different type of Europe but we also understand that we need to break down this borders and the last thing we need is this happening (a BREXIT),” he said.
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