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JOHN HUME INTERVIEW
RECORDED FROM TRANSMISSION: BBC-1 DATE: 17.10.93
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SHEENA MCDONALD: And, listening to that interview and the
previous interview with Gerry Adams is the co-author with Mr Adams of the joint
statement on the way ahead for Ulster, now before the Dublin Government: John
Hume, the Leader of the Social Democratic and Labour Party - Good Afternoon.
JOHN HUME MP: Good Afternoon.
MCDONALD: Now, much of interest - I'm sure you'd
like to comment on there. You have been working for twenty-five years to end
the troubles. For the last five years, we understand, you've been having some
kind of talks with Gerry Adams. Now, it's in the open, you need everyone
on board and already we've heard from Mr Molyneaux that he thinks the plan -
and he seems to know what it is - is sheer lunacy.
HUME: Well, in the first place, he doesn't
know what the plan is. And it's quite evident from what he's saying that
he hasn't a clue because Mr Adams and I have not agreed a plan to impose on
anyone because we don't believe that a solution can be imposed. What we are
talking about - and we've made it very clear - and all we have done,
repeatedly - and I have done repeatedly - I've asked people to read what we
have said. And we're talking about a peace process which involves both
governments and all Parties and that the objective of that peace process is
agreement among the divided people of this island. An agreement which must
earn the allegiance and agreement of all our traditions.
Now, why doesn't Mr Molyneaux address
that? Our problem here in Northern Ireland, you see, is that - and it's the
same where there's conflict in different parts of the world - there are two
mind sets. There's a Unionist mind set and the Nationalist mind set. Right.
The Unionist mind set has been: the only people we can trust are ourselves;
the only way to protect ourselves is to hold all power in our own hands and
exclude everybody else.
MCDONALD: And the National mind set?
HUME: I'll come to that in a moment. The
Unionists have always done that, they're still doing it in Local Government and
my appeal to them is: Look, I recognise your wish to protect your identity, I
respect that because we must respect our differences if we're going to solve
this problem. Victories and defeat won't work. But, there is another way
which doesn't involve excluding everybody else.
The Nationalist mind set is a
territorial mind set, which also exists in other areas of conflict. This is our
land. We're a majority and you're a minority and, therefore - and of course,
my argument about that, consistently, has been that it's not about territory,
it's about people. Without people it's only a jungle and it's the people of
this land who are divided and they can't be brought together by any form of
coercion. It can only be done by agreement.
Now, Mr Adams and myself have declared
that what we are seeking is a process involving both governments, all Parties,
whose objective is agreement among the divided people that earns the loyalty
and allegiance of all. Now, could somebody please tell me what's wrong with
that, particularly after the twenty years of what our people have been through,
if that process leads to a total cessation of all violence?
MCDONALD: Now, well, you have described the joint
statement, which you and Mr Adams have made. Of course we're operating without
actually knowing the proposals which you have forwarded to the Dublin
Government and I don't know whether there is any more to those proposals than
that statement.
HUME: We have not - we have not forwarded
proposals for a solution in terms of institutions, or anything like that. All
that speculation is nonsense.
MCDONALD: So, can we - can we deal specifically..
HUME: What we are talking about are the
principles - the broad principles - and our statement says it - which ought to
govern any approach to a solution - who should be involved: both Governments
and all Parties. What's the objective? Agreement among the divided
people that earns the allegiance of everybody.
MCDONALD: Can we deal with that suspicion or-
HUME: Yes.
MCDONALD: -knowledge that Mr Molyneaux has that
there is a proposal that in a generation's time - he said in twenty-five to
thirty years - British troops will withdraw from Northern Ireland. And, from
Day One that would be an element of the plan, once it is revealed. And,
he said, of course, we can't go with that and it would lead to violence. Now
can you deny, or confirm, that that is an element of what's on the table?
HUME: Well, well, in the first place, we have
no specific proposals for solutions on the table but what our objective is is a
total cessation of all violence. And, my assumption is if there's a total
cessation of paramilitary violence on our streets that the troops would be off
the streets within a very short time. And I think the whole community
would want that as well. And indeed the British Government have already
said to the IRA in statements: it's you who are keeping us on the streets here;
if your campaign ceases, we'll be off the streets.
MCDONALD: So, withdrawal is a part of your process
towards an agreement.
HUME: No, no. An end of all violence
on our streets - an end of paramilitaries and an end of troops on our streets
and, then, both Governments and all Parties sit down and reach an agreement to
end this quarrel once and for all. And, by the way, I do think - and, this is
very relevant - that in today our quarrel's out of date. I've said that
repeatedly. I think that there's a better atmosphere for resolving our
differences now because the nature of the Irish problem has actually changed.
MCDONALD: Then, why is it not possible for the IRA
to initiate that cessation of violence, call a ceasefire and make it a
permanent one? As Seamus Mallon has said it: it doesn't have to be written
down, he says. It doesn't have to be spoken but silence the guns, silence the
bomb and let that silence start now.
HUME: Well, we've had violence and very
serious violence and myself and my Party have been in the frontline against
that violence for twenty years and have been attacked - our homes by both
sides. And, our objective is a total cessation of violence. What I'm saying
about the changed nature is very significance. In this sense is that,
originally, the 'Irish problem', as it was called and, indeed 'the British
presence' as it's called in Ireland, was due to Ireland's links with Europe.
The coming in here and the Plantation of
Ulster was England's reaction to the links with Spain. The Act of Union was
England's reaction to the links with France. Ireland was the back door for
England's European enemies. That's all gone in the new Europe of today.
So the basis of the problem, in traditional Nationalist terms - in my opinion -
has changed but the legacy remains. The legacy is that we're a deeply divided
people and that can only be solved by agreement and what we need is the
commitment of everybody - both Governments and all Parties - to reach an
agreement. And, listening to Mr Molyneaux, I wonder does he want to reach
agreement.
He says, for example: Northern Ireland
is one people. If that's so, why does his Party exclude the minority from
everything when they're in power?
MCDONALD: Well, we'll come on to that but..
HUME: But, but I'm saying to the Unionist
people very clearly: your real strength is your numbers and your geography.
I've said it repeatedly. This problem can't be solved without you. We are a
divided people and difference is normal, difference is not something - it
exists all across the world - that we should be fighting about. We should be
accommodating our differences, respecting our differences, reach agreement and,
then, work together to build this country.
MCDONALD: But until you got over the obstacle,
which is the continuing IRA campaign of violence, that process cannot begin.
Now, would it not be helpful to be able to do that? For the IRA to begin that
process, not as a gesture of goodwill but an actual act?
HUME: I would like the IRA never to have
started. I mean I've been opposing violence throughout but the objective of
what I am now doing and I am doing it by just..by direct dialogue. I have
twelve thousand people in my Constituency who vote for Sinn Fein and their
support for the armed struggle. So, I have a responsibility to do all in my
power and the least I should do is talk. But this dialogue - and, I've said it
publicly and I don't make idle remarks - is the best hope of lasting peace that
I have seen in twenty years. And, lasting peace means a total cessation of all
violence. And, all I have asked - and, given what we've all been through in
this community - it's not too much to ask people to suspend their judgement
until they see the outcome. And, I think, that a..any responsible political
leader in this society, who really wants to see lasting peace, would suspend
judgement until they saw the outcome.
MCDONALD: You say you can't tell whether Mr
Molyneaux really does want any kind of agreement. Now, of course, Mr Molyneaux
represents people who vote for the Union and what the Unionists fear is that
your plan, or your proposals, will eventually mean the end of the Union. They
don't want that - are they right?
HUME: Well, what I have said and I've said it
repeatedly - I'm talking about my Party now - that, you know, this problem
could only be solved by agreement among our divided people. The Unionists have
agreed and the British Government have agreed and the Irish Government have
agreed, that this problem, in order to solve it, we have to solve not just the
relations within Northern Ireland but the relations within Ireland and between
Britain and Ireland. And, the central relationship - which is very obvious -
the reason the Unionists overthrew Home Rule by force against the Sovereign
wish of the British Parliament in 1912, the vehicle used by force, was because
of their fear of links with the rest of the island.
The reason they excluded the minority
from any say in Northern Ireland during their seventy years of one-Party rule
was for the same reason. The reason they opposed the Sunningdale Agreement and
overthrew it by force was for the same reason. The reason they're against the
Anglo-Irish Agreement is for the same reason. Therefore, until their
relationship with the rest of the people of this island is sorted out to their
agreement as well as the rest of us, nothing is going to work.
MCDONALD: To their agreement?
HUME: Their agreement, of course. We must- I
mean- We must reach agreement and if that agreement- If we can't reach
agreement in today's world, where all of the rest of Europe- by the way, we've
reached agreement with the French and the Germans, as to how we live together,
as to how we even run our farms; why can't we reach agreement with one another
as to how we share a piece of earth?
MCDONALD: You say the people of Northern Ireland
must agree. Now when they hear Gerry Adams on this programme saying that if
they decide that they would like their territory to be run in such and such a
way there is no veto, that their consent is not, is not meaningful in the way
they would like it to be meaningful. How can they move forward with your
proposals?
HUME: No. I think you're confusing this veto
question. The Unionists have in the past always exercised two vetos - a veto
on British policy. Now, the part of the United Kingdom - the two per cent -
they don't have the right to veto the views of the British people, as a whole.
They've done that twice in this century by force. In 1912 and again
in the Seventies against the Sunningdale Agreement. The second veto they've
had - they don't have a right to that veto. The British people have a right to
decide themselves what policies they want to pursue and the Unionists have an
input into that. The second veto that they have is on the relationships with
the people that they live with on this island. That's a natural one. That one
can only be solved by agreement.
What I want to see is everybody,
including the British Government and the Irish Government and all Parties,
committing themselves to reaching agreement on ALL of the three relationships
that go to the heart of this problem. And, if that commitment brings an end to
all violence, then, the real task is everybody round that table. And, it won't
be easy. But, the fact that it will be taking place in an atmosphere of peace,
after our twenty years, the pressures will be on everybody not to go back to
those trenches that we're in at the moment.
MCDONALD: But further to your initiative -
assuming that it gets somewhere, assuming that violence stops and it does
proceed - central to that will be that the people of Northern Ireland will
determine how they are governed in future?
HUME: There is no question, in my mind, that
any agreement that emerges on these relationships must be agreed by the
people. I mean, read the statement - the Gerry Adams - read the two
statements. The first statement which everybody - not everybody, but the
people who didn't want to agree with him. The people of Ireland as a whole
have a right to self-determination. But the statement - that's the bit they
all seized on - the bit- the statement went on to admit that not everybody
agreed with that; in other words, that the people of Ireland are divided on how
the right is to be exercised. And, we said it's agreement and the means of
reaching it that we are discussing.
In our second statement, we translate
that clearly to say we're talking about a peace process involving both
Governments and all Parties, whose objective must be AGREEMENT between the
divided people of this island, an agreement which must earn the allegiance and
loyalty of all our traditions.
Now, in the past talks, for example -
and you asked Mr Molyneaux about this.
MCDONALD: I want to talk about the future because
we only have a couple of minutes.
HUME: Oh yeah. It's the future I'm talking
about - lasting peace here.
MCDONALD: We need to talk about the future because
there is an agreement. There is the Anglo-Irish Agreement, which may be
dishonoured by some and honoured by others but there it is in place. Now, it
is, perhaps, not so much the Unionists that you need to persuade or bring on
board but it is the British Government who need to be brought on board. As far
as I know, it is not formally before the Muir Initiative but it will be.
Now, is this really the time when this
kind of initiative is going to be favoured over other ideas - the blueprint for
stability that Mr Molyneaux is offering, which he's very confident about, he
says it does represent the views of all people of Northern Ireland. Why will
this Government not favour his idea over your idea, which is already carrying
disfavour and anxiety among many constituencies.
HUME: Well, in the first place, I would have
thought that lasting peace and a total cessation of violence is something
everybody wants to happen. They want it to happen immediately, and the quicker
that both Governments assess it, in my opinion, the better, and I have no doubt
about that because that's an essential part of any process that's going to
...to lasting stability and an essential part of it also is that both
Governments and all parties be involved in reaching agreement, and I hope I
don't have to spell out to people what the word "agreement" means, and I know
that the ordinary Unionist people on the ground, because I'm getting it from
them all the time, want my process to succeed, and they know that the problem
can't be solved without them, neither can it solved without the rest of the
people.
MCDONALD: Thank you.
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