Green
Leadership in North Call for a 'Big Conversation'
on a Unified Nationalist/Republican
Strategy for the Endgame
"Sanctions
will serve no political purpose"
- John Barry
JJohn Barry, Green Party • 10 February 2005
The
leader of the Greens in Northern Ireland have responded
to the report of the Independent Monitoring Commission
with an extensive analysis of events following the
Northern Bank robbery. Dr John Barry is calling
on the British and Irish Governments to resist sanctions
and, instead, to encourage Sinn Fein to go further
in distancing itself from PIRA because "the
relationship has become a liability for both the
SF leadership and those who give SF its political
mandate." He is proposing that the Nationalist
and Republican family use the current interregnum
in the peace process to engage in a far-reaching
debate or 'Big Conversatin' on the future role of
the physical force tradition and Sinn Fein's relationship
with PIRA in the context of an endgame in the peace
process.
The
Greens believe that a restored Peace and Reconciliation
Forum might play a constructive role in prompting
the necessary conversation across the Irish Nationalist
and Republican family on developing an agreed path
out of the current crisis, based on an unqualified
and universal endorsement of democratic politics
and non-violent organisation. A restored Forum would
have to convene regular sessions in the North, and
not only in Dublin.
Dr
Barry has lamented the breakdown in negotiations,
especially the rapid progress that Sinn Fein appeared
to be making in its transition to the pursuit of
political objectives through fully democratic means.
Barry has commented: "Thanks to the collapse
of the deal before Christmas and the robbery at
the Northern Bank: We have gone from Gerry and the
Pace-Makers to Gerry-Meandering."
PART
ONE
Dr
Barry's main points on events since the Northern
Bank raid are:
Support
for the Irish Government's position on NO sanctions
against the Sinn Fein leadership because:
The question of sanctions for a criminal act is
one for the courts and should apply to those directly
involved. The IMC's attempt to link the SF leadership
is little more than speculative. In any case,
sanctions will have no POSITIVE political impact.
The Independent Monitoring Commission is an integral
part of the British intelligence machine which
is both unreliable (e.g. the illegal war by UK
and US, based on, dodgy intelligence, including
the 45-minute was brought to you by the same 'intelligence'
operatives) and highly politicised. (See quotes
below from one of the IMC members. (Annex l)
Sanctions
will serve no useful political purpose other than
to shore up Anti-Agreement forces who have - from
day one - lined up to undermine, humiliate and
defeat the Republican leadership and its constituency.
I would go further and WARN COLLEAGUES IN OTHER
IRISH OPPOSITION PARTIES AGAINST falling into
the trap of doing the work of the DUP and their
advisers in the British security services who
have pursued every opportunity to undermine the
transformation of Irish Republicanism under the
McGuinness/Adams leadership.
The
Sinn Fein leadership must recognise that it is
time for P O Neill to come in from the cold and
speak for himself. It is time to recognise that
the relationship between the Sinn Fein leadership
and the Army Council has become a liability -
which will continue to be exploited by enemies
of the Good Friday Agreement. IF THE SINN FEIN
LEADERSHIP RESPECTS ITS POLITICAL MANDATE - AS
IT WOULD HAVE OTHERS DO - THEN IT MUST SEVER THE
IMPLIED LINK BETWEEN THAT MANDATE AND THOSE within
the physical force tradition who have become a
liability, ripe for exploitation by enemies of
the Good Friday Agreement. Sinn Fein's progress
in electoral politics has reached a point where
the leverage they have derived from their relationship
with the PIRA has become an increasingly transparent
exercise in trade offs that help to erect a respectable
screen to conceal and dissemble unacceptable activities
in a society struggling to emerge from cults of
militarism and authoritarianism.
THE
BOTTOM LINE: ONCE SINN FEIN HAS CHANGED ITS RELATIONSHIP
WITH THE IRA LEADERSHIP IT WILL ONLY BE JUDGED
BY STANDARDS APPLIED TO OTHER PARTIES TO THE GOOD
FRIDAY AGREEMENT I.E. BY ITS GOOD FAITH IN USING
ITS INFLUENCE TO BRING ABOUT AN EXCLUSIVELY PEACEFUL
AND POLITICAL APPROACH TO IMPLEMENTING THE GFA.
There
is an opportunity in the coming months (or at
least following the upcoming elections) for constitutional
Nationalism and the Republican family to engage
in a thoughtful, internal and frank debate on
the future of the physical force tradition and,
more specifically, on the relationship between
the Sinn Fein leadership and PIRA. Only when a
consensus across the Nationalist/Republican family
is reconstructed - with the weak link in the chain
consigned to history and stood down, unilaterally,
for no other reason than because it was the right
thing to do - can a re-engagement with Unionism
and Loyalism meaningfully recommence.
PART
TWO
ANALYSIS:
"THE SINN FEIN LEADERSHIP HAVE BEEN HEISTED
ON THEIR OWN PETARD"
We
support the view that it may be time for the Sinn
Fein leadership to radically alter its relationship
with the leadership of the IRA. The need for McGuinness
and Adams to go all the way and call on the IRA
leadership to do its own negotiating is primarily
based on wider political circumstances, including:
The primary cause of destabilisation within the
Republican Community is the dangerous and calculated
attempt by the DUP (calculated with the advice
of British security and intelligence service)
to break the back of the Good Friday Agreement
by undermining the leadership of Sinn Fein. The
Paisley faction of the DUP has sought to do this
both for ideological reasons (sectarian fundamentalism)
and, cynically, for party political gain (to further
entrench their primacy in electoral stakes over
the Ulster Unionist Party).
The
DUP leader - before Christmas - clearly set out
to destabilise the Republican community by placing
an unnecessary barrier before comprehensive acts
of decommissioning and a standing down of the
PIRA. He left Sinn Fein voters in no doubt about
the meaning he attributed to his demands: humiliation
and defeat.
The
prolonged series of obstacles placed in the way
of fully implementing the Good Friday Agreement
has also delivered perverse benefits to Sinn Fein
by way of electoral gains on both sides of the
border. When Gerry Adams lectured politicians
last week about NOT INTRODUCING PARTY POLITICS
TO THE PEACE PROCESS, I could only think, THAT'S
RICH COMING FROM YOU GERRY….VERY RICH. No
party on the island has milked the 'peace process'
for votes more systematically than Sinn Fein.
Sinn
Fein's ascendance as a political force was always
part of the quid pro quo of the 'peace process'.
It was one of the quiet understandings of the
political class - that the Republican leadership
would deliver on a new and empowered political
mandate for their constituency in return for silencing
the guns. HOWEVER we have now reached a turning
point - THE TIME FOR CONSTRUCTIVE AMBIGUITIES,
LEGAL FICTIONS, AND A TACIT ENDORSEMENT OF EXTRA-CURRICULA
FUND RAISING (The Makro Raid and the Belfast Docks
heist) ACTIVITY AND SO CALLED 'HOUSE KEEPING'
ON THE FRINGES OF THE REPUBLICAN COMMUNITY has
run its course.
The
peace process has turned largely on the relationship
between the Republican leadership and the influence
it has brought to bear on those who have - and continue
to believe - that the Good Friday Agreement cannot
deliver equality, inclusion and justice. With the
ascendancy of the DUP - notably the Paisley faction
- the Sinn Fein leadership and its political mandate
has become exposed to calculated attempts by Anti-Agreement
forces. These Anti-Agreement forces will exploit
the relationship between the Sinn Fein leadership
and hardline elements and turn what was once viewed
AS THE AXIS OF THE PEACE PROCESS into an extreme
liability for the Republican leadership.
The
Anti-Agreement forces within the DUP will continue
to exploit a number of weaknesses within the Republican
community:
As time has moved on in the peace process, it
has become more and more difficult for the Adams/McGuinness
leadership to sell the 'peace process' in return
for:
i.
Complete decommissioning;
ii. Standing down PIRA.
Perhaps most absurd of all is the notion that
Adams and MC Guinness could rein in those elements
in the Republican community who have exploited
their paramilitary trappings to pursue criminal
activity.
PART
THREE
IT'S
TIME FOR GERRY AND MARTIN TO ANSWER FOR THEMSELVES
AND THEIR OWN POLITICAL MANDATE, AND FORGET ABOUT
'PHONING THEIR FRIEND, P O NEILL
NOBODY IS MORE AWARE OF THE LIMITS OF THE REPUBLICAN
LEADERSHIP AND ITS DEVALUED CURRENCY WITHIN THE
WIDER REPUBLICAN MOVEMENT THAN DR PAISLEY, AND HIS
ADVISERS IN THE BRITISH SECURITY APPARATUS WHO NOT
ONLY CONTINUE TO HOLD OUT THE HOPE FOR A RHETORICAL
DEFEAT OF SINN FEIN/IRA BUT CONTINUE TO PURSUE THEIR
WAR AIM OF AN ACTUAL POLITICAL DEFEAT.
For
all these reasons, the Sinn Fein leadership must
recognise that it is time for the P O Neill to come
in from the cold and speak for himself. It is time
to recognise that the relationship between the Sinn
Fein leadership and the Army Council has become
a liability - which will continue to be exploited
by enemies of the Good Friday Agreement.
If there are limits to which the Sinn Fein leadership
can exert political control over their fellow travellers
in the wider Republican community (whether this
is the result of frustration or sheer knuckle headedness)
- then it is time for P O Neill and the Army Council
to defend those limits - to articulate them - and
for all of us to decide how we are to deal with
this. MOST IMPORTANTLY, ALL POLITICAL PARTIES MAY
BE ABLE TO PUSH FOR A RESTORATION OF AN INCLUSIVE
APPROACH TO THE IMPLEMENTATION OF THE GOOD FRIDAY
AGREEMENT ONCE THE SINN FEIN LEADERSHIP AND PUBLIC
REPRESENTATIVES ARE JUDGED ONLY BY THE STANDARDS
OF OTHER PARTIES I.E. BY THEIR GOOD FAITH IN ACTING
AS PERSUADERS FOR AN EXCLUSIVELY POLITICAL AND PEACEFUL
PROCESS.
There
will no longer be a tolerance by Irish voters or
the Irish political system for a Party that wishes
to exploit every turn in the 'peace process' for
its own electoral gain, while preaching that others
should refrain and retreat. As in other areas of
our lives, what was once a virtue can become a vice
- and a liability. Such is the case for the physical
force tradition and a misguided belief in its own
infallibility which the tradition has bestowed on
elements of the Republican movement….a belief
that was always on collision course with the long-heralded
new Ireland of dialogue, democracy and inclusion.
"The reality is…."
How
often have we listened to Sinn Fein leaders insist
that their reality IS the only reality? The very
insistence and repetition of this phrase by Sinn
Fein leaders betrays an uncertainty which they ought
now to embrace without shame. The difference between
armed struggle and democratic politics is this.
In war, reality often flows from the power to impose
one's own reality on others. There is no room for
talk of interpretation and doubt….for where
would that leave the conscience of a soldier for
whom the extinction of an Other must be predicated
on an impossible certainty….a judgement for
all time? The peace process is a door to many noble
objectives (not least a new and essential dispensation
for our local criminal justice regime and policing)…but
for some it will herald a new encounter with the
messy uncertainties of democratic politics….where
the force of argument shall reside in the arts of
rhetoric, conviction and a willingness to try again
another day when one's opponent prevails.
Dr
John Barry, Co-Leader, Green Party in Northern Ireland.
All
censorships exist to prevent any one from challenging
current conceptions and existing institutions. All progress
is initiated by challenging current conceptions, and
executed by supplanting existing institutions. Consequently
the first condition of progress is the removal of censorships. - George Bernard Shaw
