Instability an opportunity for Sinn Féin - Northern Ireland elections

WHEN, after a decade or so of risky, tortuous negotiations, the Good Friday Peace Agreement was signed in April 1998, Bill Clinton had been president of America for five years, Tony Blair had been in Downing Street for just over a year and Bertie Ahern was approaching the first anniversary of his election as taoiseach. 

The horrific Omagh bombing was four months away. To their eternal credit, these men realised that a resolution of sorts was possible. They realised that it might be possible to begin to build towards a new beginning for that fractured society. Their commitment in time, energy and political capital was considerable and not without risk. Without them, without their cajoling and arm-twisting — their cheque books too — an agreement would not have been reached. The progressive influence of the European Union is not now as solid as it was then. Those drivers for peace no longer exist. The international political empathy needed to engage in a minor, interminable sectarian dispute has gone.

It would strain optimism to hope US President Donald Trump could be a peacemaker. Theresa May’s premiership is dominated by the greatest rearguard action since Hitler’s armies were turned at Stalingrad and Enda Kenny’s leadership is numbered in weeks if not days. His Government possibly equally so. The EU’s future is an open question. These positive forces are otherwise engaged.