Last month, 40-year-old Emer O’Neill, a Black Irish woman, was racially insulted three times.
Teenagers in her town south of Dublin shouted, “Go back to your country!” at her, she was rudely asked by a man whether she spoke English, and she was called the n-word at a local pub – all in the space of two weeks.
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“I don’t have another country to go to. This is my country,” said O’Neill, an activist and broadcaster who in recent years has presented Dublin’s St Patrick’s Day parade for Ireland’s national television channel, RTE.
Days later, she found herself shaking with emotion while singing at an event to remember Yves Sakila, a 35-year-old who was killed on May 15 outside Arnotts, a department store in central Dublin. In video footage by bystanders, the shop’s security guards who restrained him appear to have placed their knees on his neck for more than four minutes.
Sakila, an Irish national, immigrated from the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) when he was 13. The death has been dubbed Ireland’s George Floyd moment, reminiscent of the 2020 killing of the 46-year-old Black man in the US state of Minnesota at the hands of white police that set off mass antiracism protests.
Sakila was allegedly suspected of shoplifting and is said to have accidentally knocked down a man when rushing out of the department store. Police arrived and handcuffed him. They performed cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) when they saw he was unwell, but he was later pronounced dead at Dublin’s Mater Hospital.
As a teenager, he struggled when his adoptive parents separated, and at the time of his death, he had been living on the streets.
“He landed in care services at 16, but he never got back to normal. Even though his adopted mother wanted to bring him home, he wanted freedom,” said Lassane Ouedraogo of Africa Solidarity Centre, who first met him five years ago. Like other homeless people, Sakila was being supported by the diaspora-led organisation.
Ouedraogo described him as a “gentleman” with whom he had “lovely conversations”. “He needed help, not a death sentence.”
No arrests have been made over his death.
“We don’t need specialists to see the video and understand how he died,” Ouedraogo said.
In the wake of the incident, members of Ireland’s minority communities have described a sense of denial about racism in a country known for an anticolonial spirit.
Days before Sakila died, Bertie Ahern, Ireland’s former taoiseach (prime minister), was filmed saying, “We can’t be taking in people from the Congo and all these places,” while canvassing for his centre-right Fianna Fail party for a local by-election. Incumbent Taoiseach Micheal Martin – also from Fianna Fail – said while he did not approve of Ahern’s comments, his party cannot stop people from canvassing.
Sandrine Ndahiro, a literary critic of Black and postcolonial literature and culture at Maynooth University, said she cried for the duration of a prayer vigil outside the Arnotts store last month.
“The shop stayed open for business. People were going in and out, as if nothing had happened. They would have shut if a white person had died,” she said.
‘Too scared to be called racist’
Zainab Obasuyi, a PhD researcher at Technological University Dublin, said she has also experienced racism. In high school, her classmates chanted “Ebola la la” upon seeing her.
“Every time I speak about racism, I’m told, ‘You are too sensitive, you are overreacting, you are misinterpreting.’ Irish society is too scared to be called racist because it’s viewed as a moral failing, and hence they throw these words as a defence,” said Obasuyi, now 24. She is part of Black and Irish, a nonprofit advocacy group coordinating a coalition to memorialise Sakila.
For Jackie McCarthy O’Brien, who represented Ireland in international football and rugby in the 1980s and 90s, becoming the first Black woman in Ireland to play both sports, the fields felt freer.
“The only way people wouldn’t question my Irish identity was if I wore the green jersey,” she said. “I was a giant on the pitch. Off the pitch, I was the Black kid with the giant head. The 90 minutes of the game was pure freedom. But when you speak up, you are deemed the angry Black woman and an aggressor who rocks the boat.”
Although O’Brien is well-known across Ireland, the comments she faces are still upsetting. “People have told me, ‘You are not really Black,’ or ‘I don’t see colour.’ But why can’t they see my colour when I see their white skin?”
O’Neill said unconscious bias and stereotyping are difficult to digest because they contradict what Ireland is known for, such as its solidarity with Palestine and South Africa in the past.
“Smaller Irish towns have banners everywhere saying Ireland is only for the Irish. The racism is no longer subtle,” said Ndahiro, the literary critic.
In some Irish news outlets, Sakila, a naturalised citizen, has been referred to as a “Congolese man”.
“A Black migrant is expected to demonstrate excellence and win medals to be deemed Irish. Sakila’s Irishness got stripped away immediately,” Ndahiro said. “How can you write about feminism, human rights and racism but not show up for protests? Irish people whose timelines are all about Palestine online have not uttered a single word about Sakila’s death.”
At a recent antiracism demonstration outside Leinster House, the Irish parliament, a smaller group of counter-protesters called on “foreigners” to leave Ireland.
A Central Statistics Office survey in 2025 found that 49 percent of “Black Irish, Black African and other Black backgrounds” had experienced discrimination.
Mamobo Ogoro, a sociocultural psychologist, believes the election of United States President Donald Trump has “bolstered the arrogance of the far right, as they question migration into Ireland”.
Yves Sakila: What’s next in the case?
Along with protests outside Arnotts, flowers continue to be placed at a lamp-post where Sakila was restrained.
An initial autopsy was inconclusive, and toxicology reports might take weeks. A second autopsy will take place by an independent forensic pathologist. The national police have referred the case to the ombudsman.
Ebun Joseph, Ireland’s special rapporteur on racism and racial equality, has called for an independent investigation.
Arnotts issued a statement that it was cooperating with the national police but had not released the security camera footage to Sakila’s lawyer.
DRC Foreign Minister Therese Kayikwamba Wagner met Irish President Catherine Connolly, as well as the ministers for foreign affairs and justice.
But Ahern has not apologised for his words.
“If people in power don’t apologise, how can you expect a racist neighbour to apologise?” said Ndahiro.