Dublin Lacks Ambition | Presidential Vote | Solidarity with the people of Palestine

Dublin Lacks Ambition

Last week Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, supported by the regional independents, published their Programme for Government 2025. This contains the objectives set by the government parties for the next five years. In my ten years in the Oireachtas as the TD for Louth and East Meath I worked through two such Programmes. First in 2011 and then again in 2016. Neither Programme for Government matched the rhetoric or the commitments contained within them.

The Programme for Government 2025 is no different. It is as Pearse Doherty aptly described it “a copy and paste job from five years ago … a tired and stale document that is completely devoid of the ambition and big ideas our people need and deserve.”

Nowhere is this more evident than in its abject failure to address the major issue of constitutional change and a united Ireland. The Programme claims that the “Government of Ireland is committed to the unity of the Irish people and believes that this can only be achieved through a sustained focus on and investment in reconciliation and we remain steadfast in implementing the Good Friday Agreement in full.”

However, the Programme produces no meaningful commitments to achieving “unity of the Irish people.” There is no plan for unity. No step by step programme to advance the conversation around the issue of unity. No effort to reach out to those of a different view on unity. There are no new or substantive policy proposals to engage with those from the unionist/Protestant section of northern opinion. Moreover, the claim that the FFFGers “remain steadfast in implementing the Good Friday Agreement in full” is meaningless in the absence of any proposals to bring this about.

The Good Friday Agreement provides for referendums North and South to facilitate constitutional change. The Programme for Government makes no reference to this. Nor does it state how it would facilitate this. However useful the Shared Island initiative is - and additional funding for it is welcome- it is not an alternative to the establishment of a Citizen’s Assembly or Assemblies where representatives of the people of this island can come together to discuss all of the issues that are pertinent to achieving Irish reunification. The Programme for Government is noticeably weaker that the Fianna Fail or Fine Gael Election Manifestos. Our task is to change that. 

Presidential Vote

A further example of the lack of ambition by Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael can be found in their refusal to honour the commitment both made in 2020’s Programme for Government to hold a referendum on the extension of Presidential voting rights to Irish citizens living in the North and outside the island of Ireland.  

Non-resident citizens in over 120 countries around the world, including many of our partners in the EU, have the right to vote in elections. This is seen as an issue of equality and inclusivity which benefits the state.

In 2013, the Constitutional Convention established by the government agreed that Irish citizens in the North and the diaspora should have the right to vote in presidential elections. In November 2015 the Joint Oireachtas Committee on European Affairs recommended extending the voting rights. In October 2018 An Taoiseach Leo Varadkar announced that a referendum would be held in May 2019. The following month the government said the referendum would take place in October 2019. None of this happened. 

One of the most basic rights and entitlements of any citizen is the right to vote.
The President is not the president of a land mass; he is President of the Irish people. It is only right that all Irish people have the entitlement to vote for our President. 

 

Solidarity with the people of Palestine

As I write this column the ceasefire in the Gaza Strip is less than 24 hours old. Already thousands of displaced Palestinians driven from their homes by Israel’s genocidal war are starting to slowly make their way back into Gaza City and northern Gaza. Most carry on their backs the entirety of their possessions. Their very few clothes and personal belongs and for some the tents that will provide them with shelter among the rubble that was once their homes. Some have donkeys to help while a few of the more fortunate have motor vehicles.

Fifteen years ago when I was in Gaza City it was an overcrowded open air prison under economic and military siege by Israel. Despite that there were functioning hospitals and schools, universities and factories and shops. It was a vibrant society where young people were working hard to secure an education to help build a better future of themselves, their families and their society. Today all of that is gone and below the shattered remains of apartment blocks and houses lie the remains of countless thousands buried by Israeli bombs.

The official statistics of death total almost 50,000 dead and over 100,000 wounded. Somewhere between 15-20,000 are children and Gaza now has an enormous number of children with missing limps and no parents. Orphans of a war that was encouraged and facilitated by the western states who have abandoned international law and supplied the armaments to facilitate this genocide.

Israel is an apartheid state. It engages in collective punishment, the use of pogroms against the Palestinian people of the west Bank, the construction of illegal settlements on occupied lands, the wide-spread use of internment, the cruel and degrading treatment of prisoners, and the targeting of innocent civilians. All of these and much more is a breach of international law.

It is also widely acknowledged that the ceasefire agreement now in place hasn’t change much from the first draft produced last March. The broad outline is contained in the UN Security Council Resolution 2735 that was Adopted by the Security Council on 10 June 2024. That it took so long to reach this point is the result of a ruthless Israeli regime determined to break the Palestinian people.

For over 70 years, Israel has never faced meaningful consequences for its actions. Instead it has been protected by the United States, Britain, Germany, the European Union leaderships and others for these violations. This has to change.

The immediate priority must be to provide the humanitarian aid which Israel has blocked.

The incoming Irish government has an opportunity to demonstrate real international leadership by taking the steps needed to hold Israel to account for its actions. 

Regrettably, Micheál Martin announced on the day of the ceasefire that the new Irish government will introduce a different piece of legislation to replace the Occupied Territories Bill. His announcement raises real concerns that the government is planning to introduce legislation that will fall far short of the proposals contained in the Occupied Territories Bill. Any effort to dilute that Bill must be vigorously challenged.

Last July the judgement by the International Court of Justice that Israel's continued presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territories is 'unlawful' intensifies the legal and moral responsibility of the international community to help bring the occupation to an end. There is an opportunity for the international community to end its shameful response to this genocide and do the right thing by the Palestinian people and uphold international law.  

The aim must be to secure a viable and free Palestine and a lasting and just peace based on equality between the people of Palestine and of Israel. At this juncture that demands that a peace process is established. The cease fire is welcome. But it is not enough. It will be challenging but shaping a real peace process is the only way forward. The cessation is the first tentative step in that process. Let’s build on it.