The European and Local Elections in Ireland Gerry OShea
The recent European and Local
elections held in Ireland on May 24th provided some interesting and significant
results in both parts of the island.
The Sinn Fein vote in the
North held well in the nationalist community there, but in the South the party
dropped about a third of its support, shedding close to half its
representatives in local councils and failing to hold two of its three seats in
Europe.
This collapse was not
anticipated by the pundits and led to widespread speculation about why so many
voters abandoned the party.
It was Mary Lou McDonald's
first election as leader of Sinn Fein after decades of Gerry Adams at the top. He
registered very well with Republican voters because of his close association
with the revolution in the North. Adams claims controversially that he was
never a member of the IRA but he certainly had the whiff of cordite which drew
credibility from a significant number of nationalists in every constituency.
On the other hand many
commentators expected that McDonald, an able proponent for left-wing causes but
with no personal connection to the revolutionary years, would win the support of
progressive voters in tune with Sinn Fein's economic policies but who had opposed
the IRA war in the North. That did not happen.
One factor that hurt the Sinn
Fein vote centers on the party's abstention policy from Westminster. Normally
this strategy wouldn't bother people in the South, but the failure of the seven
Sinn Fein MP's to play any role in the Brexit debate weakens the Irish case in
these crucial negotiations.
The Democratic Unionist Party(DUP), which only
represents slightly more than 20% of the Northern electorate, commands the sole
Irish voice that is heard as the interminable negotiations for an acceptable
exit policy go on.
Sinn Fein's abstention policy
was developed in very different circumstances a hundred years ago. It is a
serious mistake to continue this approach and allow the far-right wing of
unionism to represent the interests of the people in the North, who in the
Brexit referendum voted by a clear majority to remain in Europe.
The British decision to leave
the European Union has huge implications for both parts of Ireland. One
explanation for the collapse of the Sinn Fein vote in the South suggests that
the voters, especially in the Dublin and Cork constituencies, are not pleased
that there is no voice for nationalist Ireland as the Brexit debacle continues
in Westminster.
The recent abortion and
same-sex marriage referenda divided all the political parties in the South, but
the two main groups, Fianna Fail and Fine Gael, regained their support in the
May elections. The conservative wings of both parties, who mostly disagreed with
the constitutional changes, returned to their base allegiance in the recent voting.
Some commentators suggest
that many traditional Catholic Sinn Fein supporters did not forgive Mary Lou
for her prominent leadership advocating for
constitutional change in the areas of abortion and same-sex marriage, which was
definitely not part of their understanding of traditional Republicanism.
A prominent and impressive former Sinn Fein
TD, Peadar Toibin, who strongly opposed
legalizing abortion, left the party and set up AONTU, a new group which
promotes a pro-life agenda while basically following traditional
Republican policies on economic matters
and on the national question. They barely registered in the May elections, but
they are organizing North and South highlighting a different Republican
approach to the emotional life issue.
Still with about 10% of the
vote - down from around 15% - Sinn Fein remains the third largest party in the
Dail. Ms McDonald promised a humble (her surprising description) far-reaching reflection on the poor election
results and a renewed drive to build the organization and clarify their
policies before the next general election for the Dail, which is likely to take
place in the next twelve months. Another bad election for Sinn Fein would be
disastrous for the party and surely lead to a change of leadership.
The success of the Green
Party, led by the dynamic and authentic Sean Ryan, was predicted but not to the
extent of winning more than 50 Local Authority seats and with an impressive 11%
of the votes cast sending 2 MEP's to Europe. With this level of support the
Greens are likely to have a major say in the composition of the next government
in Dublin.
The Green Revolution, as
Ryan's party's increased electoral support is being called, extended throughout
Europe. They will form a strong group in the new European Parliament. Their
focus is, of course, on the climate change crisis and the need for radical new
policies to avoid a major environmental disaster.
It is noteworthy that the
increased Green support in Europe came mainly from voters under 35, called
millennials by some experts. Polls in America also identify this cohort of
young voters as very concerned about the extreme weather that is becoming more
and more part of our forecasts. Reliable and well-qualified scientists warn us
that our universe is living on borrowed time.
President Trump, alone among Western leaders, considers
global warming a hoax, and he is consistent in pursuing policies that are
detrimental to the environment. Most millennials strongly disagree. Driven by
this issue, they are likely to have an important say on who wins the presidential
election next year similar to the impact they just had in the European
elections.
The Alliance Party, a
determined non-sectarian group in Belfast, polled well in Northern Ireland,
winning one of the three European seats, all now held by women, at the expense
of the Official Unionist Party. They join Sinn Fein as strong supporters of Britain
staying in Europe.
Will Alliance continue to
grow and win more seats in future general elections? Can they, perhaps, break
the stranglehold of sectarian voting in the North? Winning one of the European
seats was a real boost for non-sectarian politics in an area that has been
blighted by the seemingly-inexorable division along religious lines.
One other comment on the
European elections in Ireland. The big focus in Great Britain and mainland
Europe was on the level of support for narrow nationalist anti-immigrant parties led by the likes of Farage in England
and Le Pen in France. Their narrow views did not resonate with the Irish
electorate; in fact there is no anti-immigrant political party in the country.
While there are always challenging problems
when new groups settle in established communities, the traditional Christian
welcome for strangers as well as the long Irish history of sending their own to
foreign shores trumps any tendency to join disgruntled far-right groups that
advocate closing doors to stranded refugees.
Gerry O'Shea blogs at wemustbetalking.com
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