Alliance Assembly member Seamus Close has called on the SDLP to join with him in urging the Secretary of State to reconvene the Assembly in order to debate a motion to exclude Sinn Fein under Section 30 of the NI Act.
Mr Close was speaking after SDLP Leader Mark Durkan said last night that without an end to IRA violence the institutions could not be revived.
Mr Close stated: “It must now be as clear to the SDLP as it is to everyone else that since the Secretary of State chickened out of an exclusion motion in October, Sinn Fein have done nothing but bully and demand movement from a pliant Government. The Government has in turn marginalised all other parties, including the SDLP.”
“The Government has thus allowed Sinn Fein to hold the political institutions to ransom and republicans have become more arrogant by the day; so conceited in fact, that Gerry Adams feels confident enough to tell the Prime Minister to pull his socks up.”
“While doing this, Mr Adams dismisses calls for IRA disbandment and an end to activity – the type of which Mr Durkan has referred to – as unrealistic and fanciful.”
“We now have the farcical situation where those in whom trust and confidence was lost because of republican spying and other undemocratic activities now submit a ‘Heinz 57 Varieties’ wish list to Tony Blair. They hold centre stage while the innocent and more democratic parties get sidelined and reduced to cameo roles in a political farce, written and directed by idiots.”
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