Stormont Circus provides no surprises
By Caitlín Doherty
As the summer weeks grow closer, there is a sense that the Stormont
political circus is having difficulty selling its tickets. There was
no show this week, and it seems that the talking is confined to the
basement around tea and coffee. Needless to say, in this situation
the public political diary is virtually non-existent.
Meanwhile, far from the spotlight, daily attacks on the nationalist
community continue, the probes into the Pat Finucane and Rosemary
Nelson murders get further covered up, and tensions escalate in
Portadown.
Last week, Sinn Féin spokesperson on policing, Bairbre de Brún,
highlighted the blatant contradictions and irregularities in relation
to the RUC and British government's attitude towards fully
independent and public inquiries into the murders of Rosemary Nelson
and Pat Finucane.
On Wednesday, trilateral meetings between Sinn Féin, the SDLP and the
UUP were held at Stormont. There was, however, no indication that
David Trimble's obstructionist stance was changing. The day before,
Sinn Féin chairperson Mitchel McLaughlin had urged Trimble to call
the bluff of the ``No men'' within the UUP. This followed the Irish
Times/RTE poll, which showed that an even greater number of people
would support the Good Friday Agreement now, than did last year.
The poll was consistent with what Sinn Féin has been saying for
months: David Trimble is not under the type of pressure that the
Ulster Unionists are portraying in order to justify their refusal to
implement the Agreement. The poll was welcomed with scepticism,
reflecting the whole process- in the absence of any substantial
efforts to break the deadlock, the media is creating the news.
On Monday, Sinn Féin President Gerry Adams attended a reception at
the South
African High Commission to mark the country's Freedom Day. He
referred to David Trimble's rejection of John Hume's proposal for
breaking the political deadlock and said: ``I have already said that I
am prepared to stretch the republican constituency in an effort to
find a resolution to the deadlock, provided that it is within the
context of the Good Friday Agreement.''
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