Back up north
Got back from an interesting day in the Dublin count centre yesterday. It's a long time since I've covered an election when the story hasn't involved the rise and rise of Sinn Fein. This will be a test of their resilience and whether they can avoid the trajectory of the Workers party, once they lose their peace process bounce.
We had all expected a party represented at the Stormont assembly to be playing a role in forming the next Irish government. We just got the wrong party.
Sinn Fein may have prepared a negotiating team for this eventuality. But the Greens appear less well prepared.
I had a brief chat with our one Green MLA Brian Wilson today. He told me that Northern Ireland Greens are represented on the party's national executive, so could be involved in the discussions about whether to join a coalition with Bertie Ahern. But until now they have tended to look after their own patch, so it's not clear whether they will play any great role. For the Greens, these are uncharted waters.
Sad, from the point of view of journalistic colour, to see the departure of the PDs' Michael McDowell. He was always vociferous in his opposition to Sinn Fein and vivid in his language. It was a shame that we could very rarely persuade him to appear on our programmes north of the border - his reluctance to grace our airwaves seemed to jar with his passionate views about what was going on here.
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The difference between Sinn Fein and the Workers Party is that the later were never given the chance to run a country.
Maybe if they can do a job "here" the southern electorate will give them a chance, but I can't see any willingness down south to trust them with running any aspect of their country.
The other aspect of it is the broad feeling down there that Northern Ireland, and anything to do with it (including the Shinners), is best left up here, because they are getting along nicely without us thank you very much.
Mark
Clearly Sinn Fein’s narrow agenda, coupled with its abysmal grasp of economic issues, persuaded the Republic’s voters to give the Party a good kickin’. At an individual level Gerry Adams’s poor understanding of the Irish economy was embarrassingly exposed during the various media interviews and debates. Perhaps it would behove Sinn Fein to prove that it can help solve the problems here before trying to extend its influence to a foreign country (there).
Frank
Carryduff
The constitutional position of Northern Ireland has been 'technically' settled which will be subject to referendum at some future date courtesy of the Secretary of State for Northen Ireland. After the Republic's election, it now looks as though the voters have settled it from an economic aspect. They are not much interested in unity which obviously was reflected in Sinn Fein's dismal performance.