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Coulter's Pre-Election Report

Political journalist Dr John Coulter maintains the biggest pressure is on the DUP to produce a result in Wednesday's crucial and historic Stormont election

 


Dr John Coulter • 6 March 2007

On Wednesday, Paisleyism will be given the best opportunity in a generation to deliver the constructive, devolved government for the North it always boasted about – assuming Unionist voters keep the DUP as the leading voice for Protestantism.

Protestants of whatever view on the Scottish deal should remember this year marks the 30th anniversary of one of the biggest disasters in Unionist politics – the failed United Unionist Action Council strike of May 1977.

And what were those Unionists attempting to bring down? Only the same direct rule from London we still have today.

But those three decades ago, the loyalist working class generally lacked the stomach for another 1974-style crippling Ulster Workers' Council strike which brought the North to its knees.

The UWC strike smashed the power-sharing Sunningdale Executive. Had Unionist possessed the foresight in 1974 to enter power-sharing with the moderate SDLP, they would never be facing the dilemma 30 plus years later of trying to share power with the Shinners.

Only six years after its formation by the Big Man in 1971, the DUP was to the fore in pushing the UUAC strike. Paisley was joined in the strike leadership by Ernest Baird of the fringe United Ulster Unionist Party as well as UUAC chairman, the former Unionist MP Joseph Burns.

As with many DUP-inspired plots over the years, the paramilitaries lurked in the background. The UUAC included representatives of the UWC, UDA, the Orange Volunteers and the equally shadowy Down Orange Welfare.

The supposed stoppage fizzled out after 10 days in May '77, principally because the Ballylumford power station workers remained at their posts.

The two other main Unionist parties of the era, the Ulster and Vanguard unionists refused to give the strike their blessing and the British Government effectively told Paisley to 'bog off', despite Paisleyite farmers blocking North Antrim roads with their tractors.

The main reason the Brits stood firm was because they knew the Paisley camp lacked a workable alternative to direct rule.

This Wednesday – polling day – the Paisleyites need to know the Brits have a workable alternative to direct rule if the Big Man refuses to use his mandate to set up the power-sharing Executive with the Shinners by the 26th.

Indeed, by the end of this week, both Unionism and Nationalism need to have answered 'Yes' to the most historic questions ever posed in an election since the Northern state was formed in the 1920s.

Yes, the majority of Protestant voters have returned a majority of Unionist MLAs who are totally committed to establishing the Northern Executive.

Yes, the overwhelming majority of voters who care about future prosperity in the North will have come out and voted for pro-progress candidates rather than pro-polarisation runners.

Yes, Republicanism will have forsaken its outdated notion of hatred for all things British and will work with pro-Brit MLAs to make this part of the island one of the most self-sufficient and affluent in the Celtic nations.

2008 will also mark major 90th anniversary commemorations for both Republicanism and Unionism. For Unionists, they can celebrate the ending of the Great War in 1918 in which so many Northern Protestants played a huge role. Armistice Sunday will be especially poignant next November.

For Republicans, 1918 celebrates its greatest ever electoral triumph when the Michael Collins-inspired Sinn Fein captured over 70 of the 100 plus Irish seats at Westminster when the island was entirely under the thumb of the British Empire.

But the worst catastrophe for the Northern population on Wednesday would be voter apathy and the result is a significant number of anti-deal Unionists or anti-policing Republicans elected.

The Executive will go down the tubes, and the new British Emperor-in-waiting, Brown the Blackmouth, will wield his tight-fisted Scottish Presbyterian financial axe like a Sword of Damocles.

Brown will effectively tax the Northern population until every green and orange pip is squeezed dry, making leaving the Union a totally unviable cash option.

And if you want a foretaste of how horrible life will become in the North without an Assembly, just watch how a Prime Minister Brown will punish his native Scots if nationalists win the Scottish parliamentary elections in May.











 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Index: Current Articles



6 March 2007

Other Articles From This Issue:

Irish Republican Ex-POWs Against the RUC/PSNI & MI5

Whispering Past the Graveyard
John Kennedy

RSF Campaign Reports
Tony McPhillips – Election Agent

Save Derry
Brian Mór

Support Peggy O Hara
Ex-POWs and Concerned Republicans Against RUC/PSNI & MI5

Only the Beginning
Mick Hall

St Bore's Day
Anthony McIntyre

SS Sinn Fein
John Kennedy

Election Guarantees Nothing
David Adams

Coulter's Pre-Election Report
Dr John Coulter

Others Promise...
Brian Mór

The Curse of the Caudillo Complex
Mick Hall

Rest, Do Not Surrender
Dolours Price

...We Deliver
Brian Mór

Super Six Dictator
Dr John Coulter

Anyone Up for a Serious Alternative?
Philip Ferguson

The View from Outside
Jerry Pepin

Boom to Bust?
Dr John Coulter

Tyre Trees
Anthony McIntyre

Cleanliness Not Next to Godliness in the Shankill
Marty Egan

Leadership Needed
Stephen Hughes

Where Does the State of the Union Leave the Rest of Us?
Richard O'Rawe


22 February 2007

Litter & Glass
Anthony McIntyre

Not Worth the Paper Its Written On
John Kennedy

Ballot Box Pressure
Mick Hall

Commission of Truth Needed, Says O Hara
Peggy O Hara

RSF Election News
Press Release

Help Sinn Feign
Brian Mór

British Policing Must Never Be Acceptable in Ireland
Francis Mackey

The Next Step
Dr John Coulter

Conclusions from the Ard Fheis
Brian Halpin

McAleese Should be Criticised
David Adams

The Best Woman to Succeed
Dr John Coulter

Commander-In-Thief
Fred A. Wilcox

The Critical History of (Irish pop) Noise
Seaghán Ó Murchú

No Clean Hands
Anthony McIntyre

 

 

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