DUP and SF face huge decisions

Writing in the News Letter, in an excellent article outlining the problems facing Boris Johnston in Northern Ireland and how he may approach it, Sam McBride indicates that he may well up the stakes for the DUP and Sinn Féin, and force them to reach an accommodation on issues like devolution, abortion, same-sex marriage and the Irish language.

In making these choices, for both parties it could be a case of “damned if you do and damned if you don’t.”

All of these areas are fraught with danger and high risk and there is little margin for error.

One thing is for sure – the tactic of staying put and playing safe may be well and truly over.

The winds of change are blowing in Britain and Europe and we have to hope and pray that cold blast will fall lightly on us.

The Protestant community has never been weaker and more divided, and in this sorry condition it may be forced to make choices that could shape the future course of our community for generations. Our children will have to live with the consequences.

This article raises so many pertinent questions and challenges. It is for Sinn Fein and the DUP to come up with the answers.

We may well have reached a pivotal moment in Irish history where both parties have to make decisions that could yet define them and chart a road map for their future. There are no easy options.

For some considerable time the DUP has been easing away from its Protestant Christian roots in a rear guard action to maintain the Union.

They have been preparing the ground to signal a break with the past, but events may accelerate this and force them to put it to their electorate.

That’s when things will really get interesting.

The whole moral fibre of society as we know it is disintegrating and the divisions opening up cut across traditional party lines.

It would take a prophet to predict what will emerge from the chaos, and tradition suggests he would be stoned.

We really are living in momentous and interesting times.

Clive Maxwell,

Bleary