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Northern Ireland has been warned of “disaster” if Arlene Foster’s resignation triggers the breakdown of power-sharing and early elections.
Bertie Ahern – an architect of the Good Friday Agreement that brought peace – spoke out as more hardline figures in the Democratic Unionist Party jostled to succeed her as leader.
Sinn Fein could block the new leader’s appointment as First Minister at Stormont without guarantees around use of the Irish language and lesbian and gay rights.
And that could bring forward elections to its Assembly from next Spring to this autumn – amid rising tensions over the trade border in the Irish Sea created by Boris Johnson’s Brexit deal.
Mr Ahern, a former Irish prime minister, warned: “That would be a disaster. I think instability just leaves everybody in a bad place.
“Governments all over the world nowadays have coalition partners. I know there are problems, but the big picture is stable society – seeing your economy develop and to see the pandemic dealt with.”
Mrs Foster, the DUP leader since 2015, was forced to quit after a revolt by parliamentarians at both Stormont and Westminster who signed a letter of no confidence.
The toppling comes amid growing Unionist anger over the Northern Ireland Protocol, which introduced checks on goods crossing the Irish Sea – checks Mr Johnson pledged would not happen.
The governments in London and Dublin have long feared Mrs Foster’s departure would destabilise Northern Ireland’s fragile devolution settlement and the peace process.
The impact will be felt if she is followed by a more confrontational figure, determined to obstruct the Protocol which the EU has insisted is here to stay.
The early favourites – for what would be the DUP’s first ever leadership contest – are thought to be:
* Jeffrey Donaldson – the Westminster leader and, like Mrs Foster, a former Ulster Unionist seen as a DUP moderate.
* Edwin Poots – the hardline Stormont agriculture minister, an evangelical believer in Creationism who said Mrs Foster’s most important job was as “a wife, mother and daughter”.
* Gavin Robinson – the youngest contender, at just 36 and more liberal, although less so than the former leader on gay rights, it is believed.
A DUP source told the BBC that it expected tough “negotiations over the election of a new First Minister” with Sinn Fein.
“Unless there is agreement, I can see the issue being allowed to drift over the summer when not much happens and then a possible election in the autumn,” the source said.
But Matthew O’Toole, an SDLP Assembly member, told The Independent that being responsible for an early election would be a “massive political risk” for any party.
“I don’t think voters will reward them for doing that and it would be bad for the DUP, as people took a dim view of the institutions being down for three years,” he said.
And, on the prospect of a more hardline leader, he said: “It would be a strategic mistake. A growing number of people in Northern Ireland oppose regressive politics, obsessed with flag-waving and against social change.”
Mr Poots confirmed he is running, saying: “Northern Ireland is a place that has had many great things over this last hundred years. I wish to see us rebuild, revitalise, reinvigorate and revive for the next hundred.”
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