Exclusive: Sinn Fein councillor ‘suspended without prejudice’
Slugger understands that Fermanagh Sinn Fein Councillor Bernice Swift has been suspended from the party ‘without prejudice pending review’. Ms Swift’s offence? It would appear speaking out against the party line on policing and District Police Partnerships. Pete blogged her fairly cogent arguments, originally carried in the Impartial Reporter, earlier in the month:
The DPPs possess significantly less influence than the limited powers of the policing board. The Patten recommendations, (and indeed subsequent similar legislation), states that the views of the DPPs would only be ‘taken fully into account’ by the police and it also makes clear that these bodies would have no power to investigate police activities or to approve policing plans for their areas?The lack of powers possessed by these boards and sub boards means that meaningful control and accountability by the community is impossible, as the control and accountability mechanisms rest elsewhere. These accountability mechanisms may have been tweaked recently but it is quite clear to me that such activist as those of MI5 will not be subject to any interference from these boards.
This interesting for a number of reasons. It is absolutely true that political parties are in effect collective enterprises all be it made up from lots of different minded individuals. They have a right to expect members to toe the line. The trouble here is that Ms Swift’s arguments reflect the feelings of those in other parties and are borne out by the fact that DDPs have struggled to retain the interest and enthusiasm of represents from as far apart as Fermanagh and North Down. Though Ms Swift’s arguments take a much wider purview than the usual grumblings about DPPs just being ‘pointless talking shops’.
That her remarks have warranted such a censorious response may be because her critique goes to the heart of misgivings shared by a lot of people in Republican heartlands: that the deal brought Sinn Fein back from St Andrews was no better, and indeed possibly a good deal worse than the previous deal the party so heavily criticised the SDLP for, which at least gave local politicians some sense of what the Intelligence Services might be up to.
What should worry insiders is the potential loss of a talented local councillor. No party (on any of these islands) is so awash with talent that it can let go of its best people cheaply. Indeed, as last week’s poorly managed parliamentary attack and the disappointing performance of some of its key Ministers demonstrates, such top down micro management of dissent is not necessarily the best way to build up a coalition of talent, never mind a new generation of leaders.
As one commentator suggested to Slugger, it is as though the party has no coping mechanism to help it manage the enormous changes it’s going through.
truth hurts,
i would be very surprised if the sinn fein leadership would allow anyone to put forward any motions against the policing position at next years ard fheis.
I won’t pretend to know the inner workings of Sinn Fein. But I still ponder why when opportunities appear to arise within the party organisation, structure and constitution, those who disagree with the direction seem not to seize upon them. How does a dissenting opinion know how supportive the membership are of the leadership if there is never a formal leadership challenge? How can those dissenting opinions complain of dictatorship when they have not properly challenged them democratically within their own ranks? You get a dictatorship when you allow a dictatorship.
I do know the way sinn fein works and most of the people within the party with positions of authority, for example the cuige are mostly ex prisoners from the H BLOCKS/long kesh and have moved into sinn fein and are trying to run the party the same way they ran the different parts of the prison. they are very direct in the way they think the party should be going and will not allow anyone to move away from the leadership position. i do agree that only when people do stand up to them at the ard fheis and put an alternative to the delegates is there any chance of change, but they have most areas fairly well controlled by the ex pows, they decide who will stand for cllr’s, mp’s, TD’s, mla’s, so when this sort of thing happens you have no chance as they have hand picked most of the elected reps and they are the people with the profile in each area. Gerry Adams has been un opposed for the party president in sinn fein since 1983 thats 24 YEARS my own view is Adams will never resign of his own free will.
they decide who will stand for cllr’s, mp’s, TD’s, mla’s, so when this sort of thing happens you have no chance as they have hand picked most of the elected reps and they are the people with the profile in each area.
It’s all sewn up then, and I can understand the frustration that must cause to those who wish to offer an alternative platform within the party.
The question remains, though, and perhaps it will always remain unanswered clearly, as to whether or not the leadership had the support of the grassroots in their decisions on policing (the admission fee to Stormont). While it appears to have been a step too far for some (many?) longtime republicans, and there is some (how much?) uneasiness among the grassroots, there have been no major negative repercussions for SF, and, in fact, they went on to a decisive electoral victory in March. The shambles in the southern elections is another matter entirely.
In a nutshell, they gauged the mood of their constituency in the North right, i.e., they’re tired of fighting and want to get on with living their lives.
Given this, one could hope that the leadership would be more tolerant of dissenting opinions, but that doesn’t appear to be the case judging by the haste with which they suspended Cllr Swift.
and indeed most ordinary members act like the foot soldiers, willingly. they go along with the central demands of the leadership without question.
to them, turning the question with the local leadership is the equivalent to being a dissident.
the attitude is; well if it is good enough for Gerry… or they pull the old ” i was in the kesh for X amount of years” line… so you shut up in awe of what his guy had to do.
i was at one of policing public “debates”, one guy in Newry had the “cheek” to make an arguement that was against the SF corporate line. he was publically rediculed in a very personal way in the dabate. anybody who might have made anti-policing remarks would think twice.
as such the “debate” became a very quiet affair, with prepared statesment read from key people in different areas. it reminded me of those old gangster films where loyalty is sworn to the don lol.
but as someone said about the policing debate being over. it maybe inside the party. but there is yet to be an election.
when psf were casting around for reasons why they did so badly in the 26, nobody suggested that the policing thing might have played a part.
i think that alot of voters for psf will think twice in the next 6co elections. not that they will vote sdlp but just not bother coming out.
alot of the people i talk to are still really annoyed about the psf policing move.
“but to the whole concept of the civil rights movement where people living in a police state had been denied the right to have a political opinion that was contrary to unionism”
Posted by Former
Former:
How was anyone in Northern Ireland ever ‘denied the right to have a political opinion that was contrary to unionism’?
Those are idiot words, of the type used by MOPE nationalists to justify all sorts of things.
Nationalists were never denied the right to have contrary political opinions. They were free to stand in elections etc.
The problem was that many nationalists adopted a ‘this isn’t happening’ attitude to Northern Ireland. The tried to ignore reality.
Statements like the one above may comfort nationalists, but they aren’t true. Nationalists just took a long time to get their act into gear.
Harpo, you’re obviously unaware that Sinn Féin was a banned organisation in the North until 1974. Or that the Republican Clubs (the forerunners to the Workers Party) were also a banned organisation. So while these organisations were banned, and membership of the same was an imprisonable offence, exactly how could they stand in elections.
Harpo, you’re obviously unaware that Sinn Féin was a banned organisation in the North until 1974.
Were they banned in Donegal?
If SF is right in suspending Bernice Swift for taking a public position (on policing) not in accordance with SF policy decided by the party at an Ard Fhéis; then why wasn’t Gerry A suspended when he publicly took a position on corporation tax levels that was not in accordance with party policy which was also decided by the party at an Ard Fhéis.
Is it because :
a) Bernice is a woman
b) Bernice is not from Belfast
c) Bernice is telling the truth
d) Bernice still has some Republican principles left; or
e) Bernice is not Uachtarán of the party?