Protesters campaign against government’s Covid-19 guidelines in Cardiff’s city centre

On Saturday 19^th February, protesters in high-visibility jackets marched around the centre of Cardiff campaigning against government guidelines regarding Covid-19.

The main motive of the demonstration was to challenge the Covid regulations imposed by the government, however the demonstrators claimed they were using official government data as their main source of information for their protest.

While for the most part the protestors peacefully walked down Queen Street, St Mary Street and the St David’s shopping centre, there were also some more vocal demonstrators who attracted a lot of attention from passers-by. The South Wales police were present as well.

One protestor was seen holding a sign saying “Stand strong like Djokovic” followed by a picture of the human evolution leading to a sheep, allegedly suggesting that the public should follow in the tennis legend’s footsteps and refuse to get vaccinated despite government advice.

One nurse claimed that although the government reported that 6000 people had “sadly” died of Covid in Wales, most of these were actually not Covid-related deaths and were falsely recorded so that the government could exaggerate figures. She also expressed her concern regarding what is in the vaccines and claimed they should not be given to children.

The same woman also sported a jacket with various images and documents attached. One document told the story of a healthy 11 year old boy who died three weeks after being given his Pfizer vaccine and stated that “officials blame Covid injection” for his death.

Protesters were also giving out flyers with information on the Covid vaccines and the demonstrations they held. “We Stand for Freedom” was a featured slogan, claiming that medicine should be freed and vaccine passports and lockdowns should be opposed.

The Tab Cardiff spoke to some onlookers of the protest who expressed their concern for the campaign.

Second year Cardiff University students, Meghan Davies and Grace Alford, claimed that protests like these are “too late” and “won’t change anything” seeing as the majority of people now already have both of their jabs plus boosters following recent government guidelines.

They also stated that protesting in a student-populated area is “pointless” as students are eager to go out and enjoy student life now more than ever so they are happy to have the jab if that is what it takes. They said: “we’ve had enough of being indoors so we’ve had [all our jabs]”.

The protesters were very fast-moving and difficult to keep up with. Initially, it seemed that this was a tactic to cover more ground and spread their message to as many people as possible, however upon following the group for some time it was clear that a major reason behind this was to escape heated backlash from non-protesters with opposing viewpoints.

At every point, the group were greeted with laughter and derogatory comments from passers-by. Some were particularly vocal, shouting insults at the protesters such as “get a real job!” and “do you want to get jailed for misinformation?”.

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