Irish Author and Journalist - Danny Morrison

Billy Liar

With the first week of the election campaign over there is no doubt that the prize of Billy Liar has to go to the DUP. DUP billboards proclaimed that under Trimble in the next power-sharing executive that ‘big, bad wolf’ Gerry Kelly will be the Minister of Police and Justice. Of course, there is no such portfolio and the DUP omits to say that if there were then the main parties, including the DUP, might have the option of taking the post itself, under the d’Hondt principle. But why let the facts interfere with a good scare story of Gerry Kelly being in charge of the peelers and being saluted by the Chief Constable Sir Hugh Orde!

The second lie on the DUP election campaign is that after the election the DUP is going to renegotiate the Belfast Agreement. The Ulster Unionist Party, Sinn Fein and the SDLP have all stated that they will not be renegotiating – though there will be a review of the Agreement and its implementation. So, who is there for the DUP to negotiate with? The ghost of George Mitchell? The British government? If the DUP is refusing to compromise then what point is there in negotiating?

The choice unionists have to make is fairly simple. If they vote for the UUP at least they are voting for a party that has attempted to maximise their position, has already defended their interests and which is likely to return to a power-sharing executive with an Assembly, which, in turn, increases stability and the prospect of economic prosperity.

Furthermore, under this scenario, the DUP (and Jeffrey Donaldson’s dissidents), despite its alleged detestation of the “sell-out” Agreement, will go to the review, will enter the Assembly, will run for the executive, will sit on committees with Sinn Fein and will rotate the chair and vice-chair with Sinn Fein. Why, even that notorious diehard, Sammy Wilson, has said that he would sit on the Police Board with the IRA! (It’s he who calls them Sinn Fein/IRA – not me!)
However, if unionists opt for the DUP and the DUP sticks to its no-compromise stance then what we face is political breakdown – certainly if Ian Paisley’s fundamentalism holds sway.

It is a frightening prospect that a majority of unionists, intelligent people, would vote for a party whose leader thinks that God has nothing better to do but perform miracles for it. Two weeks ago Paisley announced that God had intervened and scuppered the proposed deal between Sinn Fein, Tony Blair and the Ulster Unionists at Hillsborough Castle on October 21st. Paisley declared that Blair and Trimble had “been forced to bow to the mysterious sovereignty of divine providence.”

However, to most observers the cause of the breakdown was David Trimble who reneged on the deal he had made with Gerry Adams. It didn’t matter that the IRA had put beyond use a record large number of weapons. The unionist community, Trimble said, was not satisfied and had to see or hear for itself the exact details of all the weapons and explosives that the IRA had destroyed.

But to Ian Paisley it was God who decided things. May well Paisley have felt blessed. The DUP is united and sensed that this might be the party’s (and Paisley’s) last attempt to supplant the Ulster Unionists.

Certainly, in the first week of the campaign the DUP appeared to be out front – cocky and ebullient, the Big Man with his Giants Causeway grin, apparently hoovering up the voters.

But then the arguments started taking shape. The DUP began coming under scrutiny. When challenged it refused to say what its negotiating position would be. It hasn’t been able to say whom it will be negotiating with. Paisley said: “It is no surrender to the IRA. We will not discuss it. We will not debate it, until you (the IRA) are prepared to repent”. Clearly, Ian Paisley will need another miracle.

Last Thursday, when the four main party leaders were due to appear on a UTV election programme, Nigel Dodds replaced Ian Paisley, suggesting that Paisley wasn’t up to scratch or was an electoral liability. Trimble riled and easily outmatched Dodds and went on to state that the DUP’s campaign was one of his party’s greatest electoral assets.

“What this canvassing material does is cause considerable irritation to our supporters who look at this in the way we have just done and their jaws just drop in amazement at the effrontery of the lies that the DUP tell,” he said. Interestingly, a few days later, Peter Robinson, on the BBC’s ‘Inside Politics’, conceded that he believed there was no chance of policing and justice powers being devolved for at least another four years, thus exposing the ‘Minister Gerry Kelly’ story as being simply an attempt to scare unionist voters.

Given Trimble’s strong performance on television against the DUP it is regrettable that he didn’t display the same vim throughout the year against his own dissidents or that he hadn’t the courage to face them down and recognise the magnitude of what the IRA did in mid-October. But given the lingering animus between unionism and nationalism perhaps fighting this election without being linked to Sinn Fein opportunistically provides Trimble with a way of maximising his vote - and combating Billy Liar.

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