Sinn Fein stoops to new low over veto for Stormont monument

No-one can have been surprised by Sinn Fein’s vetoing of a proposed monument at Stormont to mark Northern Ireland’s centenary.

The republican party has made clear its disdain for the centenary of this country for many months now, but it has surpassed its own lowly standards by becoming the only political party at Stormont to oppose a monument so modest that it could have caused offence to no-one.

Consisting entirely of a map of the Province with the simple and inoffensive words: ‘Erected to mark the centenary of Northern Ireland 1921–2021’, the monument would have stood somewhere in Stormont’s grounds.

Needless to say Sinn Fein couldn’t provide a sustainable reason for its objections, claiming limply that unionists failed to discuss the proposal with the other parties.

In fact the DUP, UUP and TUV have followed procedure, writing to chairman of the Assembly Commission Alex Maskey earlier this year and by offering to cover the cost themselves, the parties ensured there would be no cost whatsoever to the taxpayer.

What was particularly significant yesterday was the response of the SDLP. In issuing a statement of its own, confirming not only that it lodged no objection to the proposal but also recognising the centenary’s importance to unionism and the absence of cost to taxpayers in the project, the SDLP highlighted Sinn Fein’s crass approach.

Sinn Fein’s refusal to even acknowledge what the centenary might mean for a large proportion of Northern Ireland’s population and to take such a petty stand on this monument is a sad indictment of its leadership north of the border.

Of course this whole issue is laced with irony. Sinn Fein is the party that shouts the loudest and most often about equality, but it has shown unequivocally here that it has no respect for unionists in Northern Ireland.

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