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In
1974, as in other years since the beginning of the
current conflict, the graffiti that accompanied
new year (P) IRA statements boldly heralded that year
as the year of victory.
Three
decades later, and after an intervening period of
no direct military action by the IRA, a cessation
of almost a decade; a political agreement that was
trumpeted as the pathway to peace and reconciliation
and several failed attempts at the restoration of
devolved rule in the six counties, the vitriolic wall
daubings of the 1970’s have long gone, but according
to
the IRA statement at the dawn of 2004, so has the
latest opportunity to resurrect the power
sharing assembly.
A
recent highly obnoxious development of the local politician
has been to post their new
year messages, or in basic terms mission statements,
in the local and provincial press.
If we needed reminders of the abject failures that
comprise the vast majority of
our political class, then this is an extremely crass
method of doing it. I for one do not
need to be told in this way that our politicians are
only sticking their faces in the papers to
remind us that next year there will be another election,
possibly another dozen, who can tell; when
the real reason is that if the British decide to bend
the rules of democracy again we will have
the chance to get them their full pay instead of a
mere 75% for doing nothing.
At
a time when most of us were under the influence of
alcohol induced optimism for the bright
opportunities that the clean slate of a fresh twelve
months offers, the IRA were in the process
of releasing a terse assessment of the political events
of the dying days of 2003 had produced.
Basically the statement boiled down to the placing
of blame at the door of the British
and Irish governments for the mishandling of the situation.
Hardly a ground breaking approach,
but perhaps true nonetheless.
So
at the start of the fourth year of the new millennium,
and to copy a phrase used by our
trans-Atlantic politicians in assessing the yearly
fiscal position of the USA; What is
the “State of the Union?”
With
the expected review of the Good Friday agreement to
begin fairly soon, it will not be
long before the various party’s start canvassing
for public approval of their twist on the situation.
Novembers farcical election has produced a prospective
executive which has at last
proved to the umpteenth degree that the 1998 accord
was nothing new and enshrines the
demarcation lines of sectarian polarisation. Therefore
despite the changes in the party’s at
the head of unionist and nationalist mandates, the
position is just as staid if not more so than
before the poll took place. The opprobrium attached
to the ghost executive ruled in
absentia by the DUP and Sinn Fein, is largely to do
with the need for the press to jump on
a story as the well rapidly ran dry in the wake of
the election and the
grinding deadlock
that ensued. The fact was that this deadlock was there
long before the poll took
place and the only change that has actually occurred
was a change in the representation
of either extreme on the spectrum, but as it turned
out it has made an already critical
situation begun to slide rapidly to it’s terminal
conclusion.
The
awaited statements from the different party’s
will undoubtedly produce a level of cautiousness
leaning towards the gloomy as the deadline of the
review approaches, this will
of course be in direct and startling contrast and
contradiction to the carnival atmosphere that
almost all party’s indulged in back in November
in an attempt to beguile us into the polling
booths.
With
all that said the November election proved that Ian
Paisley does now speak for the majority
of the Unionist people. Let us be clear about this
however. Do not be fooled by the claims
of the DUP that the greater and stronger policy of
that party was the reason for their ascendancy.
When a party has perfected the ability to answer no
to every single question posed
to them, is possessed of a vehemently anti-catholic
ethos, and a refusal to recognise the
nationalist majority on this island has a right to
self-determination far outweighing an antiquated
neo-colonial notion of superiority based on a need
to retain economic monopoly which
is justified by a claim of divine patronage and buffed
to a poisonous sheen with a
wafer thin culture, it does not make them ideologues
but demagogues.
DUP
electoral success in 2003 was purely capitalisation
on the weakness of the UUP, and specifically that
of David Trimble. Trimble’s UUP lifeline is now
beyond precarious, with even
stalwart backers like David Mc Narry unprepared to
speculate about his survival beyond the
UUC meeting in March. With the much mooted defection
of Jeffrey Donaldson to the DUP
still forthcoming it would be foolish to precipitate
the denial of his return to the UUP in
the coming months.
Top
of the Paisley’s January sales list is the replacement
of the Good Friday agreement.
So
we now have Sinn Fein wishing for a review of the
process taking no more than a month,
the UUP for all their squirming probably agreeing
to the same because of the election
results and the majority party wanting it’s replacement.
The SDLP are still too busy
meanwhile attempting to rebuild to have any effective
input at all. How foolish then was
Trimble’s stalling of the structured deal between
the UUP and the IRA in the run up to
the election as part his jaded attempt to play the
hard man broker of the unionist caucus?
This
served only to further soften an already limp grip
on his waning position within the UUP
and bolstered the vote of the party he had tried to
unceremoniously shaft by his actions.
Still,
the calculation of these variant equations within
unionism are mere distractions from the fact
that the overall process is concerned only at the
moment from removing plaster splinters from
it’s Achilles tendon having eventually hit a
concrete boom. The boom of course being right
along the border!
The
very issues that were of concern between Sinn Fein
and the UUP pre-November are exactly the same ones
that are now of concern between Sinn Fein and the
DUP. Police reforms, the dismantling of border security
installations and the question of amnesty for people
still on the run from the security forces are as biting
now as they were three months back, six months ago
or in 1998. The level of stalemate of the situation
between Sinn Fein and the DUP on these issues
are no more than they were between the UUP and Sinn
Fein as the whole process is totally
intractable anyway.
However
it is vital to make a distinction between the peace
process and the political process.
The
political situation is without doubt becoming increasing
bleak, but recent statistics indicate that
the political death toll here is far from what it
once was. In the year just passed there were ten
killings related to paramilitary actions. Of these
ten, one was deemed to be overtly sectarian and
the remaining nine came as a result of the internal
dispute within the UFF.
The
British and Irish governments are yet again left with
a seemingly incalculable mess
on their hands. Even Tony Blair’s superficially
never ending stream of patience must
by now inches away from a water shortage warning,
the only thing keeping him
going at this point is the fact that the devolution
of the whole of the union is in
fact part of his overall long term economic vision.
Bertie Ahern’s problems are at
the moment even more pressing that his British conterpart.
Having just assumed the
presidency of the European union at a crucial juncture
and with local elections and
a Euro election looming, neither of which he or Fianna
Fail are assured of surviving, his
already obvious reticent approach to the north may
become increasingly withdrawn as
time marches quickly on.
The
grounds for optimism in this scenario are at best
gossamer thin.
Whilst
they are talking to Paisley in the forlorn hope that
he may be struck by a conversion on
the scale of St. Paul’s on the road to Damascus,
the British still obviously see Trimble as
the most affable face of unionism. They are obviously
hoping that he is around long enough
to resurrect another go at this problem in the near
rather than the medium or long term future.
Again however, rather than show any sign of trust
and progress no party will show any guts
or radical changes of heart as they will have their
eyes firmly set on next Junes Euro poll, in
the wholly mistaken belief that they must pander to
the whim of their respective electorates, to
whom they pay no attention to whatsoever anyway.
We
could be in for another classic compromise that as
usual will owe more to semantics than
it does to actual and solid political progress. We
may see an “improved” or “redressed”
agreement,
in which the DUP could semantically claimed that it
scrapped the GFA as it said it
would, whilst the SDLP, Sinn Fein and the UUP could
claim it was merely a modified version
of the original. That sounds plausible at least, however
plausibility and actuality are
rarely words that sit easily together in the lexicon
of northern politics. Hope and History do
not rhyme, despite the claims of the title of a certain
politician’s recent autobiography.
So
what indeed is the state of the union?
It
is still as ill as it ever was but still receiving
enough bitter anti-biotics in the right areas
of the body politic to keep if from imminent collapse,
and it definitely needs a break
from the anti-inflammatory treatment. As for the year
of victory, well, check back
in 2016 to see if the graffiti has returned.
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