It’s not EU, it’s me!
We will still be friends: May
BRITAIN filed for divorce from the EU yesterday, with fond words and promises of friendship that could not disguise the historic nature of the schism – or the years of argument and hard-nosed bargaining ahead as the UK leaves the embrace of the bloc for an uncertain future.
Prime Minister Theresa May triggered the two-year divorce process in a six-page letter to EU Council President Donald Tusk, vowing that Britain will maintain a “deep and special partnership” with its neighbours in the bloc. In response, Tusk told Britain: “We already miss you.”
May’s invocation of Article 50 of the EU’s key treaty sets the clock ticking on two years of negotiations until Britain becomes the first major nation to leave the union – as Big Ben bongs midnight on March 29, 2019.
The UK joined what was then called the European Economic Community in 1973. Its departure could not come at a worse time for the EU, which has grown from six founding members six decades ago to a largely borderless span of 28 nations and a half billion people.
“This is an historic moment from which there can be no turning back,” May told lawmakers in the House of Commons, moments after her letter was hand-delivered to Tusk in Brussels.
In the letter, May said the two sides should “engage with one another constructively and respectfully, in a spirit of sincere co-operation”.
But for all the warmth, the next two years will be a tough test of the notion that divorcees can remain good friends.
May is under pressure not to concede too much in exchange for a good trade deal with the EU. For their part, the other 27 members of the bloc will need to stick together and stand firm as they ride out the biggest threat in the union’s history.
In the pro-Brexit heartland of Dover on England’s south coast, some were jubilant as May pulled the trigger.
“I’m a local church minister, and I said to my wife, ‘All I want to do before I die is see my country free from the shackles of Europe’,” said 70-year-old Mike Piper, buying a copy of the Sun tabloid with the front-page headline “Dover and Out.”
Former UKIP leader Nigel Farage, who campaigned for years to take Brexit from a fringe cause to a reality, said Britain had passed “the point of no return”.
May’s letter to Tusk was conciliatory, stressing that Britons want to remain “committed partners and allies to our friends across the continent”.
But there was a hint of steel in May’s assertion that without a good deal, “our co-operation in the fight against crime and terrorism would be weakened”.
Tusk said he would respond by tomorrow with draft negotiating guidelines for the remaining 27 member states to consider.
As in many divorces, the first area of conflict is likely to be money. The EU wants Britain to pay a bill of as much as € 50 billion (R823bn). Britain acknowledges it will have to pay something, but is sure to quibble over the size of the tab.
A final deal must be approved by both the British and European parliaments. – ANA-AP