Parties ‘owe it to Omagh victims’ to restore Assembly
METHODIST peacemaker Rev Harold Good has called on the leadership of the DUP and Sinn Fein to “come together” and restore power-sharing in Northern Ireland following the 20th anniversary of the Omagh bombing.
The former church leader was one of two independent witnesses who oversaw the decommissioning of IRA arms in 2005.
In an open letter to the leadership of both the DUP and Sinn Fein, published by journalist Eamonn Mallie on his website, Rev Good appealed for Arlene Foster and Michelle O’Neill to “come together and do whatever it takes” to restore the Assembly.
He said he had been moved to write to the party leaders after the anniversary of the Omagh bomb, saying he was inspired by the “courage” shown by the families of the 29 victims who died.
“Surely we owe it to these yet quietly grieving people of incred- ible courage — and to those for whom they grieve — to come together and do whatever it will take to restore OUR Assembly and our confidence in normal effective governance?” he wrote.
Rev Good said he feared people here “are learning to live with political inactivity”.
He added: “I plead with you once more, listen not to predictable and tired old voices like mine, but to those from Omagh and to so many others from across our community who, out of their unspeakable suffering, have shown us in their own incontrovertible way how to face the challenges of the present and the future with dispassionate courage.”