In January 2017 the North burst, Ireland’s traditional big-government coalition. Over 600 days later, the Region still has no government, while the Brexit raises existential questions. Peter Geoghegan in Belfast.
At the end of August, hundreds of people demonstrated across Northern Ireland. Many waving homemade banners with the message: “We deserve Better.” Northern Ireland had just set an unwanted world record: Never before a country was no longer without a government. There were 589 days, and the count continues.
The good Friday agreement, which ended in 1998, the armed conflict in Northern Ireland, that the nationalists and unionists in Belfast’s Stormont Parliament, in the district of the Power to share. Until January 2017, the Catholic Irish Republican Sinn Fein and the Protestant hardliners of the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) ruled as a coalition partner. Since then, a series of talks produced no agreement on a new government.
#WeDeserveBetter – “We deserve Better”: Protest at 28. August in Northern Ireland
Hardly anyone expected that a functioning government before the EU-exit in March 2019. “Before the Brexit nothing is going to happen,” says Claire Hanna, members of the Irish-nationalist social democratic and Labour party (SDLP). “Northern Ireland Public has the nose full. All of them are angry.”
Commonly failure of the government to be punished parties from the voters. Not so in Northern Ireland. The remains deeply divided between those who remain in the United Kingdom, and those who want to be part of the Republic of Ireland. Both the DUP than Sinn Fein to reach in surveys, more peak values. And both were able to grow in the British house of Commons elections in the summer of 2017.
“The blame for the failed formation of a government will be distributed according to party affiliation,” says Hanna of the DW. “DUP voters to show Sinn Fein, Sinn Fein voters to show on the DUP.”
Westminster out of holds
If there used to be a political stalemate in Stormont, had asked the London-based Central government in Northern Ireland under their direct management. This is currently politically impossible. Because Theresa Mays conservative minority government on the votes of the DUP MPs in the Westminster Parliament relies.
Instead, Mays Northern Ireland-Minister Karen Bradley announced that the competences of the Northern Ireland administration. “We have expected a year ago. Now it seems to be what”, said a senior Northern Ireland civil servant who wants to remain anonymous, compared to the DW. “The DUP influence in London means that you can not prescribe directly to management.”
Northern Ireland-Minister Bradley was, in the meantime, get yourself under pressure, after she had told a journalist that she knew before taking up office, little about Northern Ireland and it was also a little scary.
Sinn Fein and the DUP do meanwhile to each other for the stalemate is responsible. In August, the DUP in Stormont unrolled a banner that Sinn Fein ankreidete to a standstill and DUP Boss, Arlene Foster, has called on Sinn Fein, “to end the Boycott and to make a government here in Northern Ireland is possible”.
Arlene Foster, Chairman of the Protestant and unionist DUP
Sinn Fein politician Conor Murphy played the Ball and said that his party had reached in February an Agreement with the DUP, this was shortly resigned to the fact.
For Steve Aiken, a member of the small Ulster Unionist Party, Sinn Fein and the DUP responsible for the deadlock.
Ex-Prime Minister, Arlene Foster is involved in a lengthy scandal of the cost explosion in the introduction of heating systems with renewable sources of energy, could cost you, according to many observers, the DUP presidency.
“Foster was disastrous for the Union. And devastating for the whole of Northern Ireland,” says Aiken. The Ulster Unionist calls for a reconstruction of power-sharing in Stormont, the need to govern according to yet nationalists and unionists together. “It should be possible to not be able to form a coalition government under the strongest party to form, even if Sinn Fein or the DUP follow suit,” said Aiken of the DW.
The Brexit and Ireland’s borders
The Brexit complicates the formation of a government in Belfast. The ulsterman had voted by a majority for remaining in the EU. And while the DUP strongly supports the outlet to the EU, calls for Sinn Fein to hold a Referendum on whether Northern Ireland should join as a result of the Brexit, the Republic of Ireland.
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New tensions in Northern Ireland by the Brexit
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Brexit: New tensions in Northern Ireland
Meanwhile, the question of the Status of the intra-Irish border to the Central sticking point in the negotiations between the UK and the EU. 20 years after the good Friday agreement, London insists that the Brexit Northern Ireland will not damage. Dublin feared, however, changes to the previously open border.
Some observers detect a target orientated policy in Northern Ireland anyway, beyond the structures of government: “Even if the Parliament is currently suspended, pass the present, many creative things in Northern Ireland,” said Peter Shirlow, Director of the Institute of Irish Studies at the University of Liverpool to the DW.
Shirlow is working on a project that wants to explore new spaces for dialogue in the Northern Irish civil society – through “Mini-Publics” in various Communities, beyond the often strong party political debates. “What we are trying to show, the other, the unheard voices, which can make is usually hardly noticeable,” says Shirlow. In a Belfast without a government, you might have a Chance to be heard.