REPUBLICAN NETWORK for UNITY
Address
Irish Republican Forum For Unity
Now, with over a decade having passed since the signing of the Good Friday Agreement (GFA) it is an appropriate time to review whether or not that ‘agreement’ has been a success or a failure.
This being the case, allow me on behalf of the Republican Network for Unity (RNU) to thank the organisers of tonight’s debate – the Irish Republican Forum for Unity – for providing a platform for all Irish Republicans, or at least those who are interested, to openly and candidly discuss the merits and demerits of that ‘agreement’.
In order to assess accurately the success or failure of the GFA it is important to be clear about the terms of reference and benchmarks that are used to make such a value judgement. Now bearing in mind that the GFA was portrayed as the “constitutional” route by which the illegal and immoral division and occupation of Ireland could be resolved, assessing how much closer we have come to that lofty in the past ten years appears to me to be an appropriate starting point.
Now, as we are all painfully aware, the realm of politics is not like the realm of economics, were the compilation of a balance sheet gives a ready indicator of pluses and minuses. However, in an attempt to tease out the salient points allow me to construct a ‘political balance sheet’ that we can use as a guide to gauge progress or the lack of it since 1998.
At this point it is only fair that I point out that while I may not be the best person to compile the plus list, but I will do my best and perhaps there are members of the audience who will fill in the gaps!
Anyway, even before but in the run-up to the signing of the GFA two major minuses had to be conceded to even allow Republicans within Sinn Fein to have an input to the GFA, they were;
Republicans had to sign up to the Mitchel principles especially the principle of consent, this ensured that the constitutional position of the six counties remained within the hands of the artificially created unionist majority.
Agreement from Republicans within Sinn Fein to endorse a referendum calling for the abolition of articles 2 and 3 of the ‘Free State’ constitution.
While these two ‘concessions’, in terms of the constitutional right of Republicans to struggle for the achievement of a united Ireland, were inexcusable it marked the beginning not the end of a process conceding. With the endorsement of the GFA Republicans immediately had to endure further humiliation by;
Accepting, or at least tolerating, Britain’s legitimate right to govern this part of Ireland.
Endorsement of the RUC, renamed the PSNI, as the legitimate force of law and order and the acceptance of the use of paid informers – only now co-ordinated by MI5 in a new £50 million base paid for by us!
Over the next couple of years as we witnessed the failure to arrive at the core ideal of the GFA, that is, the establishment of local government, a plethora of further minuses were set as pre-conditions. They included;
Unilateral decommissioning by the IRA of its weapons and with them the IRA’s ability to defend Nationalist communities and its de facto admission of defeat.
Once the above was conceded the IRA then had to decommission its structures and both of these minuses had to be verified by an unaccountable Unionist quango, the independent monitoring agency.
And now that both of the above have been given up the IRA is being asked to disband entirely and accept responsibility for 35 years of war as if the IRA were the only combatants fighting.
While the above is not an exhaustive list of the minuses, from a Republican perspective, I think we should try to list some of the pluses in an attempt to give some balance.
Now no matter how much I try to come up with pluses stemming from the GFA the release of prisoners is the only one I can come up with. And even at that it must be remembered that the releases were conditional and prisoners remained on licence and carried with them the tag of a criminal record. In sum then, from where I stand Republicans had to give up much much more than they gained from the GFA.
Of course, many proponents of the GFA argued at the time and still do, that the GFA was not a panacea nor was it a ‘Republican’ document, rather it was a “work in progress”! This progress would be demonstrated by, devolved government, devolution of policing and justice powers, an Irish language act, the establishment of an all codes National stadium and interpretative centre at the site of Long Kesh prison camp. After ten years of waiting and many humiliations these points of “progress” are still in waiting!
Still others argue that even if the progress which should have been made has n’t been things now are better than they were in 1998. Not only are Irish people no longer dying or going to prison but things economically and socially are improving. Do the people in the Bogside or Ballymurphy, Bellaghy or Boho really feel safer, richer and happier than in 1998?
However, even if one gives some credence to the argument above the most quoted reason for accepting what in other circumstances would be considered a humiliation is the ‘fact’ that the only alternative to the GFA is a return to war. The ridiculousness of this statement is only outstripped by its stupidity. War in Ireland has never been initiated by the Irish people, rather it has always been Britain who has been the aggressor. This fact is still in evidence with a British military presence in Ireland larger than that in either Iraq or Afghanistan. Irish people have repeatedly attempted to assert their right to national sovereignty in a peaceful and democratic way and only when left with no alternative but to defend themselves have the Irish went to war. To claim that Irish men and Irish women have no alternative but to accept British rule and Unionist domination is to abdicate any claim to give leadership to the Irish people. Historically what gains Republicans have made have been made by opposing the British state not by accepting it as a ‘fact’ of life, others have tried the constitutional route to a United Ireland and failed, the GFA does not even represent a constitutional route so what chance has it? And if someone was really serious about looking for an alternative to the GFA why not begin by looking at a process of oppositional politics?
It is my opinion that to date the GFA has made no progress towards the creation of a 32 county socialist and democratic Republic and shows no sign of ever doing so. At best it has created a situation whereby it is now okay to say that you are Irish, so long as you remember that you are an Irish person living in Britain. Further to this, it has created a situation whereby Irish Republicans who gave so selflessly in pursuit of the goal of a Republic are now so disillusioned that they would prefer to sit at home rather than continue with their activism. And as the ranks of their former organizations become filled with the nodding heads of ‘constitutional careerism’ that disillusionment slowly turns to resentment.
This is a state of affairs that we need to address by encouraging all Republicans to re-engage in the struggle for Irish freedom, firstly by taking part in open and constructive debate about our past successes and failures and then putting the lessons we learn in to practice. This initiative here tonight by the Irish Republican Forum for Unity is a good first step in that direction. I look forward to many more to come.