A local pastor has said that he understands why people are planning to protest the Government tomorrow over the disastrous fire at Grenfell Tower, which he described as a 'monument of shame to this country'.
Pastor Derrick Wilson of the Tabernacle Christian Centre on Latimer Road, who has been helping the victims of the fire since it broke out early last Wednesday, told Christian Today: 'We know that what is going on here in north Kensington is not being shown on the media. The majority of those affected are in trauma counseling. The victims are in three figures – not the figures being showed.'
The latest official death toll is currently 79.
'If people want to go on the protest they are entitled to – they want the truth, they want justice, they are grieving, they are angry,' said Wilson. 'I have talked to the victims myself and the traumatic stories that are coming out – you have no idea psychologically, mentally what they are going through. People are going to have a breakdown.
'Especially when it did not need to happen. It was predicted to the letter 18 months ago when the local association took their report to the council.
'When I look at this tower is a monument of shame to this country – like something out of Syria, Aleppo.'
The comments came amid fears among some that the protest, aimed at coinciding with the planned Queen's Speech, is being politicised.
Militant groups are planning to march on Parliament in a show of anger at the Government's austerity policies that they say led to the tragedy.
The protest is reportedly being led by the Movement for Justice By Any Means Necessary, formed in 1995 by a number of Marxist groups.
Campaigners are allegedly urging protesters to 'walk out of school, take the day off, call in sick, strike'.
The movement's Facebook page declares: 'We must escalate our actions to take down this rotten government, which has lost all authority to govern.'
Antonia Bright, a member of the SOAS Students' Union and one of the event's organisers, told The Sunday Telegraph: 'You have to ask what does it take to make this Government stand up and listen? This is about justice for everyone. I would expect people from all strands to be there.'
The calls for a mass protest this week came after an angry demonstration outside of Kensington Town Hall on Friday afternoon, when relatives and friends of those feared dead in the Grenfell fire forced their way into the building.
Several of the protesters carried banners reading 'The Tories have blood on their hands' and 'Kick Theresa May out of Downing Street'.
Pastor Wilson added: 'We are just paying for God's peace, that it doesn't spread over into a riot. You can feel the anger. The Church needs to pray for our nation – five disasters [four terrorist attacks and the Grenfell Tower fire] in four months. Unprecedented. The Church should be realising that something is wrong. These are dark times for the nation. As the Church goes, the nation goes. We must be a light in the darkness.'
