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IAIN WATSON: An idyllic scene - if this
were rural England, the biggest worry about delaying elections would be
whether foot-and-mouth could be brought under control. But this is County
Fermanagh in Northern Ireland where the stakes are higher. The town at
its centre, Enniskillen, was devastated by an IRA bomb on Remembrance Sunday
1987, killing eleven people.
Enniskillen has tried to put the past behind it but the future remains
uncertain. Momentum in the peace process has been stalled until after
the General and Local Elections, bringing dangerous uncertainty for all
the pro-agreement parties -but in particular, the result of these elections
could place a question mark over David Trimble's future.
PETER WEIR MLA: Clearly I think it is a
crucial election for David Trimble. He could either be vindicated by this
election or find himself politically finished.
GERRY ADAMS MP: Well the Lord helps those who help
themselves and one of the very good things that pro-agreement Unionists
could do, is to tell the world and their voters that they are pro-agreement
Unionists and that they do support the agreement.
WATSON: Here in the Fermanagh and
South Tyrone constituency, David Trimble's party used to be given a clear
run by fellow Unionists. But no longer. This time anti-agreement Unionists
are mounting a challenge and in doing so, could split the Unionist vote
and hand the seat to Sinn Fein. That in turn would bolster their ambitions
to become the largest nationalist party across the province. But in some
other seats David Trimble's candidates could lose out to those of Ian Paisley's
DUP and a nightmare scenario for the British government is that on June
eighth, David Trimble himself becomes the only pro-agreement Unionist left
at Westminster.
WEIR: David Trimble is
the one that perhaps has the best chance of getting in, I think would be
favourite in his own constituency but looking around the other seats, it's
difficult to see where you could predict any degree of certainty of a pro-agreement,
another pro-agreement Ulster Unionist getting elected.
WATSON: James Cooper, is vice president
of the Ulster Unionists and a staunch supporter of David Trimble. Along
with the Chairman of the local Chamber of Commerce, he's inspecting a creamery
which closed down recently and is discussing the need to bring more investment
to the far West of the province. He feels the optimism which accompanied
the signing of the Good Friday agreement three years ago needs to be sustained;
so long as the peace process continues, business opportunities will improve.
JAMES COOPER: For the first time, we have
real prospects of attracting in inward investment money from the United
States and from Europe. We are now at a stage where we can credibly sell
Northern Ireland as an attractive place for investment and that is something
that has been a change and a significant change with the agreement, so
we must sell it, on the basis of providing stability and opportunity and
that's one of the back-bones of the agreement.
WATSON: Maurice Morrow, a Minister
at Stormont, has been selected by the DUP to fight Fermanagh and south
Tyrone; he's angry that David Trimble is sitting in government with Sinn
Fein; he says they're inextricably linked to the IRA, which attacked his
home town of Ballygawley.
MAURICE MORROW MLA: About fifteen years ago, the IRA arrived
with a barrack buster bomb and forced their way in and shot two constables
here in the police station.
WATSON: There's speculation Maurice
Morrow may stand down to avoid splitting the Unionist vote and handing
the seat to Sinn Fein but he says he'd only do so if the Unionists replace
their candidate with someone more to his liking.
MORROW: When the Ulster Unionists
signed the Belfast agreement they aligned themselves on the same side of
the agreement as Sinn Fein IRA and the SDLP. They effectively split the
Unionist community - that in fact was the design of the Belfast agreement,
to split the Unionist community and they have said that they are putting
someone up who is a protagonist for the Belfast agreement. We are now left
with no choice, but to go forward and stand in this election and give the
people in this constituency who are opposed to the agreement an opportunity
to do that in this forthcoming election.
WATSON: At the last General Election
David Trimble's Ulster Unionists were clearly the largest party with ten
seats at Westminster. The SDLP had three, while Sinn Fein and Ian Paisley's
DUP had two apiece, with an independent candidate taking the remaining
seat. But last year the Ulster Unionists lost South Antrim to the DUP
in a by-election and may not win it back. And now, some Ulster Unionists
fear that as many as five more parliamentary seats across the province
could be vulnerable to the other main parties.
Here at the devolved assembly at Stormont, Alex Kane is an adviser to
pro-agreement Unionists; and he's press officer of the Ginger Group Reunion,
which tries to get the benefits of the Good Friday Agreement through to
all Unionists. but he's not hopeful. Although the local elections were
delayed here at David Trimble's request, Alex Kane fears that up to a third
of the party's councillors could also be on the way out.
ALEX KANE: Well I think the nightmare
scenario would be three seats, but if they had the local council elections
on the same day, they could also lose fifty to sixty councillors. But
the other problem of course facing Trimble is that a majority of the candidates,
that Unionists will have to vote for, are anti-agreement, so no matter
how successful he personally is, he cannot win on that simple headcount.
WATSON: One of these anti-agreement
Unionists prominent in the ranks of David Trimble's party is assembly member
Peter Weir. He's been selected as the official Unionist candidate to fight
the seat of North Down at the next General Election -though he's currently
in a protracted court battle to stop pro-agreement Unionists from deselecting
him.
WEIR: I think what is happening
in North Down is symptomatic of a lot of the tensions that are existing
within various parts of the country, within the party and I think that
can't bode well for a good electoral performance. If you've got a party
where a lot of people don't like each other, where they strongly disagree
with one another, that's not something which the electorate will find particularly
attractive, irrespective even the merits of the agreement or not.
WATSON: David Trimble could do
with a bit of help from some unlikely allies - if the IRA begin decommissioning
ahead of the General Election then David Trimble's electoral prospects
would be improved. But don't hold your breath. Over the years Sinn Fein
have been gaining on the SDLP as the predominant Nationalist Party and
if they do even better at this election then that could be seen as endorsing
a strategy which has brought Sinn Fein into government without the IRA
handing over any of their guns.
Michelle Gildernew is
the fresh face of new look, soft focus Sinn Fein - but she intends to build
support in the constituency by evoking the memory of a previous Republican
victory. It was twenty years ago that a prisoner on hunger strike became
the MP for Fermanagh and South Tyrone
MICHELLE GILDERNEW: Bobby Sands' victory was our
first stab at electoral politics in this phase of the party's history and
I hope that I can live up to the legacy that Bobby Sands has left.
WATSON: Michelle Gildernew isn't
in a mood to offer succour to David Trimble.
GILDERNEW: It doesn't help when other supposedly
pro-agreement parties continue to dig themselves deeper into holes of their
own making. So I think you know there is no chance of the IRA decommissioning
this side of an election but it has to be said too, the IRA's commitment
and their courage and the initiatives that they are taking have not been
reciprocated and have not been recognised by the Unionist Party.
WATSON: While Sinn Fein's candidate
expects no decommissioning before the election, their President can't guarantee
that the IRA will make any progress before the end of June, which is the
government - and David Trimble's - proposed date for the handing over
of terrorist weapons
ADAMS: It isn't a deadline. I mean
look at the Good Friday Agreement, clearly it isn't a deadline. I actually
see personally and as part of a leadership that it's crucial that we go
back into negotiations with an increased mandate. I think it's crucial
to send a message to those who don't like Sinn Fein's peace strategy, send
a message off that it's popular, that it's endorsed. I think it's necessary
to vindicate what we have been doing.
WATSON: It's likely that the SDLP
will retain the three Westminster seats that they hold, but if enough SDLP
supporters vote tactically for Sinn Fein then Gerry Adams' party has the
potential not only to hold the two seats they have but to add two more,
taking their tally to four.
ADAMS: There is a four per cent,
less than four per cent separating the four main parties in the north and
in this election, or the next election, Sinn Fein intends to be the largest
party. Not the largest party in the nationalist side, but the largest party
in the state
WATSON: Indirectly, this man could
help David Trimble; he's Tommy Gallacher, SDLP candidate in Fermanagh and
South Tyrone, with a high enough vote he could split the Nationalists and
prevent Sinn Fein taking the seat; he reminds voters that he has always
argued for peaceful change.
TOMMY GALLAGHER MLA: I remember being here in the late
Sixties at a rally where there about a couple of thousand people from County
Fermanagh who took part in their local Civil Rights march from the far
end of town walking up to the Diamond here. The Civil Rights campaign
was overtaken by the violence and for many years human rights suffered
right across the community.
WATSON: His party has rejected
an electoral pact with Sinn Fein to boost Nationalist representation so
he'll be competing with Gerry Adams's party for votes.
GALLAGHER: I am very confident because
of the role the SDLP has played throughout its lifetime that we will continue
to be the largest party on the Nationalist side and we'll continue to be
the party best placed to deliver all elements of the Good Friday Agreement.
WATSON: But Trimble-aid could take
a more direct form. The former US President Bill Clinton will return to
Northern Ireland next month to help sell the benefits of the agreement
to all communities. But it's hoped his intervention may just rekindle the
waning enthusiasm of some pro-agreement Unionists. And the British government
will also do what they can to sustain confidence in the Good Friday Agreement
this side of the elections
The all-party negotiations
here at Hillsborough on the peace process have been stalled since January
but the government wants to resurrect them as soon as the elections are
over.
The Northern Ireland Office
has drawn up a series of briefing papers looking beyond the election and
one discusses the possible consequences of a Unionist meltdown in the polls.
There are fears that not enough pro-agreement Unionists will turnout on
election day. Over the next few weeks there will be a campaign to try to
boost voter turnout and government ministers while being careful not to
endorse any particular party, will be co-ordinating a series of speeches
to try to sell the economic benefits of the Good Friday Agreement.
The local paper in Fermanagh
was founded by William Trimble - apparently no relation to David. But the
better known Trimble may regret having no editorial control because the
paper's front page highlights the continuing battles within Unionism. So
if all the attempts to persuade enough pro-agreement unionists to go to
the polls fail, then the predominance of the Ulster Unionist Party is under
threat and that would spell bad news for David Trimble.
WEIR: I think he would
have grave difficulty if we find ourselves as the second party of Unionism.
I think that people would find that very difficult within the party to
accept and I think there will be at least a need for a change of direction
for the party and potentially under those circumstances I think the leader
would have to look at his position as well.
WATSON: The people of Northern
Ireland will be hoping that the peace of the Fermanagh countryside will
become everlasting. But the local and General Elections could be a watershed
here. If enough Ulster Unionist support seeps to Ian Paisley's DUP, then
David Trimble could see the backing for a pro-agreement strategy in his
own party drifting away.
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