FactualThe emergence of a “third force” alongside nationalists and loyalists in the Northern Irish legislative elections on May 5 could spark a debate on the mandatory coalition system between Protestants and Catholics.
A new wind is blowing in Northern Ireland: a new generation says it is fed up with the old divisions between the “greens” (nationalists, pro-reunification of the island, mainly Catholics) and the “oranges” (loyalists or unionists, loyal to the nation’s affiliation with the United Kingdom, mostly Protestants). They are in their twenties or thirties, too young to remember the “Troubles”, those thirty years of civil war which tore Protestants and Catholics apart until the end of the 1990s.
On the eve of the general elections on May 5, many are expressing their distrust of the two parties which dominate local politics, Sinn Fein (pro-reunification) and the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP, loyalist), and who are very likely to emerge first from the polls again. These two parties have shared power since the early 2000s, in a forced coalition system inherited from the 1998 Good Friday Agreement, now deemed dysfunctional and paralyzing. “This system was designed to force the majority Protestants to share power with the Catholics. But it maintains sectarian divisions, because it forces people to declare themselves on one side or the other.explains Agnès Maillot, specialist in Northern Ireland at Dublin City University.
Crossed a stone’s throw from Falls Road, a nationalist stronghold in West Belfast, Kevin is 30 years old, with cheeky eyes and loud words. “The leaders of Sinn Fein, they are all c… The old people will vote for them, but not the young. How do you want to vote for a reunification of the island, if you don’t even know what it will look like? » The young girl with whom he is talking, leaving a supermarket in this working-class district, where many frescoes honor the “heroes” of the nationalist struggle, does not seem more motivated, neither by the elections nor by Sinn Fein. The party could however arrive at the head, for the first time in the history of Northern Ireland dominated since its foundation, in 1921, by the loyalists.
A less sectarian democracy
Hair dyed red, dog on a leash, Andrea shares their skepticism. She lives in Sandy Row, a loyalist stronghold close to the city center, she is 28 years old, claims to be a member of the LGBTQ + community; she refuses to say who she will vote for, “in any case, not for the DUP, it’s for my mother’s generation, she always voted for him”. Aoife Clements also won’t say who her newsletter will go to: “I have to remain neutral because of my activity”, explains the young woman of 28 years. Coming from a Catholic background in South Tyrone (a rural region, close to the border with the Republic of Ireland), a graduate of the prestigious London School of Economics, she created 50: 50 NI, an NGO advocating parity in politics. . “I want to convince women that they can do politics in Northern Ireland, despite past conflicts and the political landscape, which is still very masculine. »
You have 56.64% of this article left to read. The following is for subscribers only.