Ditching Stormont won’t solve the basic problem that we just don’t like each other |
My fellow columnist Brian Feeney was in rare old form last week, urging Sinn Féin to abandon the ‘failing Assembly’.
In fairness, I do have broad sympathy with the point he is making, although I would argue that the failure is as much to do with Sinn Féin as the DUP.
The two of them bought into the St Andrews deal – two governments in the one executive, as I described it at the time – which allowed them to reassure their respective bases that they weren’t actually sharing power with each other.
It’s clear the only reason the deal was struck was because neither party had an alternative strategy on offer.
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Indeed, the entire deal was predicated on the freedom it gave them to do their own thing.
When the DUP realised how uncomfortable its base was with the Chuckle Brothers relationship between Pasiley and McGuinness, the key members of the party and the Martyrs Memorial orchestrated his defenestration faster than you could shout ‘No Pope Here’.
It was also the Sinn Féin base’s discomfit with Arlene Foster post-2015 which persuaded the party to use the ‘ash for cash’ issue as its much-needed opportunity to bring down the Foster-McGuinness leadership.
There have been a whole series of moments when the DUP and Sinn........