Whether Cowen stays or goes, it’s the end of Fianna Fáil as we know it

ACCORDING to the last census there are 4,239,838 of us living in this republic.

And every single one of us is being let down by the charade that is now masquerading as the government of this country. Not just the men and women out of work. Not just the thousands of people whose only recourse is the emigrant trail.

All of us have been let down. Not for the first time, of course, but surely this is the last straw? How is it possible that anyone would want to allow these people to remain as our government for a moment longer? We are watching the death throes of a once great political movement.

Whatever the future holds for Fianna Fáil as a political party, its days as a national political movement, almost without parallel in the democratic world, are over.

Never again will they be able to command the unquestioning trust and loyalty of a significant proportion of the population. Never again will there be people willing to identify themselves as seed breed and generation members of the party. Fianna Fáil’s capacity to transcend politics is gone. Instead, and almost overnight, it has become a tawdry parody of itself.

At his press conference on Sunday, the Taoiseach said “for Fianna Fáil the party is important but the interests of the country are paramount”. But the very fact that he was holding a press conference, and throwing down a gauntlet to dissidents he said didn’t really exist, makes a mockery of that statement. For months now, Fianna Fáil has been obsessed with itself and nothing else. This obsession is about popularity, not values. It’s about the face on the poster, not the future of the country.

And that obsession, day by day, is doing damage to the country that’s supposed to be paramount. Some months ago, in a staggering reversal of everything it stood for, Fianna Fáil invited the IMF into Ireland. Had they been in opposition when that happened, they would have taken to the streets in protest at the betrayal of our independence brought about by that invitation. But they were in government, and it was their incompetence that had made the invitation unavoidable.

One of the consequences of that invitation, as I understand it, is that several rooms are booked in the Merrion Hotel in Dublin for the last three days of every month. Those rooms are occupied by IMF and ECB officials, who survey events since their last visit and satisfy themselves that Ireland is still meeting the rigorous conditions laid out for the money they have allowed us to use.

What will those officials see when they land in the Merrion Hotel at the end of this month? Chaos, blood on the floor, more ministers gone, a government that is totally out of control, a political party where back-biting and rumour-mongering are the principle currency of exchange. A couple of short months ago, IMF and ECB were promised faithfully that whatever else, this government was totally united in its determination to (at last) do the right thing.

And now look at it.

As I sit down to write this, Micheál Martin has announced that he won’t vote for Brian Cowen this afternoon. He wants him gone (even though, astonishingly, he won’t resign from office either). A couple of hours earlier, Cowen told a press conference that he wasn’t anticipating anything other than a civilised debate among friends.

There isn’t, he said, “an ounce of difficulty” between himself and his colleagues. You’d have to wonder what planet that judgement came from.

By the time you read this, more of Cowen’s colleagues will have taken sides, either for him or against him, and the idea of a civilised and friendly debate will be seen for the nonsense it is.

Today is about a knockdown drag-out fight for the remnants of political power to which Fianna Fáil are still clinging.

And by the end of today, what will have happened? The two likeliest scenarios are simple — Brian Cowen will win, or Brian Cowen will lose.

But if he wins, what on earth does he win? He presides over a government that has been torn apart. He faces into an election within weeks of some of his party’s most senior members voting no confidence in him.

There will be parts of the country in that election where he won’t be welcome among his own — where it would be hypocritical to campaign alongside erstwhile colleagues.

And if he loses, what then? Someone else — maybe Micheál Martin, maybe not — will take over as leader of the largest party in government. But the new leader will not be Taoiseach, unless a majority of the members of Dáil Eireann agree to do something that has never happened before since the Constitution was adopted 84 years ago. And because he or she won’t be Taoiseach, he or she will have no constitutional right to dissolve the Dáil.

Of course, if Cowen loses the vote today, he has forfeited the confidence of a majority of members of the Dáil anyway. But still he can’t be forced to call a general election, unless those members of his own party who vote against him today also vote against him in the formal no-confidence motion tabled by the Labour Party next week. In fact the probability is that some members of Fianna Fáil — including some who aspire to national leadership – will find themselves in the absurd position of voting no confidence in Brian Cowen today, and voting full confidence in him next week.

In other words, Fianna Fáil are in the process of turning politics into a complete travesty. And they are doing so as our country struggles with the greatest crisis of economic confidence we have ever had. Precisely at the moment when their country needs them most, they have turned in upon themselves.

THERE have been many great men and women in Fianna Fáil over generations — and there are good men and women in that party today.

The contribution they have made to the economic and social development of our country has been immense. The way they have positioned themselves at the heart of the political culture of Ireland has been unique — it is truly one of the things that made Fianna Fáil great.

Uniquely, as I said, it transcended the status of party and became a national movement. Regular readers will know that I have never voted Fianna Fáil, but I have often written here about the reasons Fianna Fáil members can be proud of a distinguished history (a history that of course has had its very dark side too).

Over the last few months, they have thrown all that away. Economic and social development has been deeply undermined by the mistakes made by a party that grew complacent and arrogant in power. Their contribution to Ireland’s independence was replaced by a graven capitulation to the IMF, with little or no negotiation and no recourse to the democratic processes of the state.

And they have abused their place in our political culture with this mindless power struggle, the latest episode in an unseemly obsession with status and office that simply demeans politics.