If IRA disarm now, they can never again shoot themselves in the foot

HERE we go again. All must wait with bated breath for the IRA’s next historic statement. Yet again they have us all hanging around - and have kept all the media attention focused squarely on their agenda.

When the latest round of ‘consultations’ within the republican movement were launched by Gerry Adams at the start of the recent Westminster election campaign, an IRA response was expected to come quickly after the election results were in.

Then it was all going to happen in June. Next, the assessment was that early July, before the marching season got into full swing, would operate as an effective deadline. On Monday, reporting on the Blair/Ahern summit, RTÉ’s Tommie Gorman, who is usually a well-informed reader of these timescales, suggested that the IRA statement was now expected “in the days after July 12th”. It all has too familiar a ring to it.

We are left playing the usual game of interpreting and reinterpreting the nuances of government and party statements for some idea of what might really be going on behind the scenes. One of the questions being asked most often this time around is what is Bertie really at? What are we to make of the Taoiseach’s unpublicised (but he argues not ‘secret’) meetings with the Sinn Féin leadership, and what are we to make of the retrospective revelation now that these meetings took place?

Why was Bertie thinking out loud that the re-imprisoning of one of the Shankill bombers might have been a mistake? And why, suddenly, all this concerned talk from the him about this year’s marching season? Is it purely a coincidence that these matters were also the subject of almost all of Gerry Adams’ most recent speeches and columns?

Even though the North has had a few relatively peaceful summers, there is always the potential for a crazy incident to set the province alight and send the process back years, but is it wise to talk up that possibility?

Could it be that the provisional movement is talking up the marching season because, having pushed the timescale past July 12, they are hoping now for (or banking on) a marching season that doesn’t go well and they can then argue that this has made it impossible for them to deliver their communities’ expectations for an end to paramilitary activity. You’ve guessed it - the timescale will be pushed out further again, and the media and diplomatic pack will continue to pant in expectation of an historic breakthrough.

If they really wanted to contribute to a peaceful marching season, shouldn’t the IRA issue a clear, historic statement now? One interesting thing Tony Blair did say on Monday was that “events of earlier this year” had raised the “credibility threshold” for the IRA.

“Events of earlier this year” is the prime minister’s euphemism for the cumulative effect of the Northern Bank robbery, the Irish Government’s suggestion that the Sinn Féin leadership knew about it in advance, the murder of Robert McCartney, the cash seizures in Dublin and Cork, and all the associated controversy. The events of earlier this year have certainly caused credibility inflation - and the de facto price the republican movement will have to pay has gone up, and gone up considerably. Whereas last December allowing photographs to confirm decommissioning might - with a bit of further fudging on the criminality issue - have got Sinn Féin over the line and back into government, now much more will be required of them.

The new reality is reflected in the fact that the IRA has removed the McCabe killers as a bargaining chip. The Munster brigade will just have to live with the fact that its men in Castlerea prison will have to serve out the rest of their manslaughter sentences.

That reality is also reflected in the fact that there will now have to be a definitive ending to all paramilitary and criminal activity - confirmed in deed, and not just in word.

The events earlier this year have also changed the context in which Northern policy is made in the Republic. Some (particularly Northern pundits) are very hung up on how the perceived threat from Sinn Féin exerts an influence on Bertie Ahern’s policy.

However, the fastest growing party in the Republic, currently, is Fine Gael. If it repeats or improves on its performance in last year’s local and European elections, and if the Government continues to languish at its current low level in the polls, then Fine Gael will threaten more Fianna Fáil seats than Sinn Féin could ever dream of.

THE Government attitude to Sinn Féin and the IRA has become a significant leverage issue for the middle ground, middle-class portion of the electorate in the Republic where, like everywhere else, they are the key swing constituency.

Ahern must insist on clarity like never before because to do otherwise will not only undermine his goal of completing the peace process but also because to be too accommodating to Sinn Féin would play badly with the middle-class, middle ground support upon which he relies. Events of earlier this year have had the additional side effect that many in the Republic see it as less unreasonable for unionism to insist on a considerable period of verification before entering government with Sinn Féin. Although the intensity which revelations about the extent of IRA involvement in criminal activity in January and February gave rise to has abated some, it is still a potent issue in our political system, not so much on the FF-SF axis but along the more significant FF-FG axis.

There is another consideration. Settling for anything short of what the Government looked for on criminality last December, even if Ahern himself could accept it (and, to his credit, it appears he won’t) will certainly not wash with the Progressive Democrats. Wouldn’t that be a vote-plated issue on which to break with Fianna Fáil? There will be no such break-up on this issue, but it does mean coalition realities are also operating on the need for the IRA’s move to be a bold one if it is to be acceptable even to the Government.

Tommie Gorman made another point on Monday about how much of the optimism and trust which was around after the Good Friday Agreement in 1998 has since drained away. If anything that was an understatement - the hundreds of gallons of water leaking from the National Aquatic Centre are nothing compared to the trust and confidence which has seeped away from the peace process on the unionist side - and support for the process was shallow enough at that end to begin with.

This has given rise to another significant event “earlier this year” which now has to be factored into the equation, namely the dramatic strengthening of the DUP’s mandate in May’s Westminster elections. Not only did the DUP spectacularly surpass the UUP, but it also gobbled up the support base of most of the smaller unionist parties and unionist independents.

By playing it too clever by half, Sinn Féin and the IRA have only enhanced their enemies and strengthened the DUP’s hand. By stringing us all along again now they are not helping their cause either. They should get on with it, and if they don’t we should get on to some Plan B.