‘Problem with SF is it still takes its orders from the Provos’
Letting the party into power in the Republic would cannibalise Irish democracy, argues Alban Maginness
After almost 100 years, Irish parliamentary democracy faces an unprecedented existential challenge with the imminent danger of Sinn Fe in being part of the new Dublin government. Leo Varadkar’s Fine Gael party can, rightly, be proud of the fact that they were the party that established the new, independent Irish Free State in 1922 and, in the process, laid down the foundations for a workable parliamentary democracy that has successfully withstood the test of time.
Crucially, in 1932, Eamon de Valera, Fianna Fail’s founder and leader, who had opposed the setting up of the Free State, peacefully took up the reins of office and established Fianna Fail as the natural party of government.
This remarkable transition of power was achieved a mere decade after the end of a fratricidal civil war, which saw much bloodshed between former revolutionaries.
After this historic achievement, despite mutual bitterness and resentment, both parties consolidated the institutions of the state, including Dail Eireann, the civil service, the Irish army and the Garda.
A stable and free democratic state emerged over the next hundred years, of which both major parties can be proud of having brought about, in a Europe deeply divided by the competing ideologies of fascism and communism, an international economic collapse and the conflagration of the Second World War.
Now, with Sinn Fein’s remarkable electoral surge and its demand to be in government, that very achievement of a stable parliamentary democracy is under serious threat, not because of Sinn Fein’s past history with the Provisional IRA, but because of its contemporary institutional link with the Provisional IRA’s ‘army council’ and the effect of that body’s overarching strategy on Sinn Fein.
The army council of the Provisional IRA was never disbanded, nor, indeed, for that matter, did the Provisional IRA itself disappear, although its members were stood down and its arms finally put beyond use in 2007.
It is, therefore, not the bloody past of the Provisional IRA that is concerning, but rather the disturbing present, where the Provisional IRA pulls the strings of Sinn Fein and its TDs in the Dail.
The former Sinn Fein TD Peadar Toibin (now leader of Aontu) has recently confirmed that Sinn Fein TDs had no say over policy decisions taken in the Dail.
Last week, the highly respected Garda Commissioner, Drew Harris, a man of great policing experience, when questioned by the Press about the Provisional IRA, agreed with the PSNI’s assessment that both Sinn Fein and the Provisional IRA are strategically overseen by the army council.
This PSNI assessment was made in 2015 after the murder of Kevin McGuigan in Belfast by individual members of the Provisional IRA in revenge for the murder of senior Provisional IRA member Gerard ‘Jock’ Davison.
This assessment was reiterated by the PSNI in November 2019, after the publication of the Independent Reporting Commission’s report on paramilitarism.
Much attention has been paid to David Cullinane exuberantly shouting “Up the ‘RA!” after he was elected as a TD in Waterford for Sinn Fein.
But what he unwittingly revealed, in his elated state, was simply the underbelly of subversion within Sinn Fein. He obviously regarded his election victory as a retrospective validation of the Provisional IRA’s violent campaign.
However, less attention was paid to his election agent’s remarks, when he declared that Sinn Fein had “broken the Free State”.
By that statement, he was, in effect, revealing his political hostility to the legitimacy of the democratic parliament and state to which his candidate had just been elected.
It is to Fianna Fail leader Micheal Martin’s great credit that he has rejected the idea of joining with Sinn Fein as a partner in a new coalition government.
He has stated, in a forthright fashion, his objections to Sinn Fein, because of their association, past and present, with the Provisional IRA.
He has stated that the issue of whether or not the Provisional IRA army council still oversees Sinn Fein is not going to go away.
Only Sinn Fein can remove that party’s ambiguity in relation to democracy and the rule of law. Only they can disperse the shadow of a gunman that lingers within their ranks.
Micheal Martin has, instead, advocated a grand coalition between Fianna Fail and Fine Gael, together with the Greens, or other smaller parties. This would not only make good sense, but would serve the national interest.
Such a government would provide much-needed political stability for the next five years and create a space to tackle the huge challenge of the post-Brexit trade deal with Britain.
It would also allow the new government to progressively address the pressing issues of housing and the health service.
But, more importantly, it would serve to protect the Irish body politic from the corrupting influence of Sinn Fein, who, if put into the national government, will eat into and cannibalise Irish democracy.