Petition Collecting reaches over 9,000

------------------------UPDATE------------------------

What an amazing week! Today was the final day of our adventure at the Piazza canvassing for signatures; for the petition aimed at urging the Governor to act in maintaining the integrity of British Gibraltar Territorial Waters.

The amount of signatures gained on this final momentious day I hear you ask?

Well very straight forward - 902

Which brings our final number (provisional as there are around 400 still to come in) to:

9475!

We aim to hand in the petition towards the end of the month (more details to follow once date has been set), and are in the middle of planning just how to do that in an interesting way. Current scheming is confidential ;)



So whats going on in other news? Well the Gibraltar Chronicle featured a front page article on yesterdays incursion, even sporting the photograph which one of our members Trevor Bickerstaff took. Even more suprising was an interesting comment piece by the editor itself which made me smile from ear to ear - for those of you who havent seen it yet, it is below (when you read it, you will understand why I had such a grin on my face).


But for the very much reduced emissions (at least one point in its favour) the rust bucket flying the Spanish flag is gradually getting close enough to shore that it might do well to take advantage of the very good services Gibraltar’s ship repairing industry can offer.
You have got to be pretty pathetic to be a nation the size of Spain and have your flagship sail past a nation the size of Gibraltar’s with an outsize flag flown simply to middle finger a community it purports to be respecting the interests of. Of course the gesture is really to Britain and it’s about as unsophisticated as one can get.

It is our challenge, in a mini-country like Gibraltar, to maintain a sense of proportion and to recognise where we are in the world’s political pecking order whilst never forgetting the importance of defending our rights and having them defended.

But it should not be so difficult for a Government of Spain, which aspires to a place on the UN Security Council, to show a little more dignity and diplomacy. Que payasada….

It’s not just with Gibraltar. In his own backyard Foreign Minister Garcia Margallo, instead of deploying, as Westminster does with Scotland, a wooing campaign with Catalunya, comes out with remarks such as describing aspirations for independence as an attempted ‘coup d’état’. 

Gibraltar has shown consistently that it is fully aware of the dangers of a drive for independence in a world where partnership and alliance is everything. We have also demonstrated, not least in the response to joint-sovereignty threats, that size does not matter when it comes to democracy.

In any self-respecting country the cretin responsible for yesterday’s flag stunt would be disciplined, unless, of course, he is sitting in Madrid fiddling in the Palacio Santa Cruz.

In other news, Jim Dobbins MP, Chairman of the All Party Parliamentary Group for Gibraltar will be asking the Foreign Office to summon the Spanish Ambassador, in order to make the strongest possible Protest at the latest series of incursions by the Spanish Navy. I sincerely hope someone makes a fresh batch of the strongest coffee possible, so the Ambassador can smell it all the way from the Spanish Embassy (if its still open tomorrow - you never know with all the cuts they are ordering). Or will the FCO sacrifice Gibraltar once again on the altar of Anglo-Hispanic relations?

Jim Dobbins MP

Lastly, congratulations have to go to Andrew F and Christine B D for being the first to break the code put up on the blog on monday! Both have won a Defenders of Gibraltar Cap which we will try to get to you as soon as possible :) - for those who didnt break it, this is what the coded message said, essentially a joke a spanish colleague sent to me last week:

El Presidente Mariano Rajoy, y su chofer paseaban por una carretera, cuando subitamente atropellaron a un cerdo matandolo instaneamente. 

Rajoy le dijo a su chofer que fuera a la granja para explicarle al dueno lo sucedido. 

Una hora mas tarde, ve a su chofer tambaleandose, con un cigarro en una mano, una botella en la otra y su ropa desarreglada

"Que paso?" Pregunto el presidente al chofer, y este respondio 

"bueno, el granjero me dio el vino, su mujer el cigarro y su hermosa hija el amor apasionadamente"

"Por Dios Que les dijiste?"

"les dije - Soy el chofer de Rajoy y acabo de matar al cerdo"

LOLOLOLOL


 Here are the photos from the final day at the Piazza - I hope you enjoy them! Till the next installment, take care and keep going strong Yanitos, que sin duda venceremos!

Photo Ops galore!

Dog says "sssh, que yo soy un dog not you"

Signatures

'I heard the word on the street is that DoGs meet at the Piazza?'

More signatures!

Scoop for Panorama! Using photo taken by DoG

Dog fight - the final battle

Another signatory :)

Keep those signatures coming!

Multiple signatures calls for multi tasking - men watch and learn....

Must....take....photo....of.....amazing.....banner!

The signing never stops, and neither does the DoG

Sign here please!

More keep coming :)

The older generation are the real fighters - they have been there done it and got the t shirt :) hats off to you

The signing just keeps going on and on

Thank You for your time and your signature! Viva el Wally!

Oh PS - heres a new code ;) little bit harder than the last one - btw the next one will be picture based code tee hee:

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