Opinion

Lyra McKee funeral: A yearning for political stability alone is not enough

Karen Bradley, Theresa May and Leo Varadkar at Lyra McKee's funeral service. Picture by Liam McBurney/PA Wire
Karen Bradley, Theresa May and Leo Varadkar at Lyra McKee's funeral service. Picture by Liam McBurney/PA Wire Karen Bradley, Theresa May and Leo Varadkar at Lyra McKee's funeral service. Picture by Liam McBurney/PA Wire

IT'S been an extraordinary week. A public outpouring of millennial grief and outrage that far eclipsed that around the relatively recent dissident republican murders of prison officers Adrian Ismay and David Black, and Catholic PSNI constable Ronan Kerr. The president, the taoiseach, tánaiste and British prime minister were all present for Lyra McKee's funeral in Belfast, which was broadcast live on 24 news networks. Arguably, not since the aftermath of Princess Diana's death has a single incident sparked such a spontaneous reaction and desire to ensure nothing similar happens again.

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The anger aimed at the New IRA and its apologists in Saoradh is proportionate and entirely justified. A group that recruits impressionable teenagers, uses firearms indiscriminately in a residential area and murders innocent bystanders deserves the unrelenting negative attention it has received in recent days. But the past record of similar groups suggests the calls to disband will ultimately fall on deaf ears and even if the current personnel do decide to abandon their futile struggle, others even more reckless in their means are likely to take up the mantle of armed republicanism.

The hope that Lyra McKee's killing will be a watershed that can affect major change is a worthy and genuine sentiment voiced by those who have lost a friend. However, there is often a flaw in these gut reactions and sudden groundswells, in that they overlook the complexity of many issues and assume our political predicament is caused simply by cold obstinacy rather than the outworkings of centuries of historical antagonism.

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No doubt Mary Lou McDonald, Arlene Foster and Michelle O'Neill squirmed in their pews as Fr Martin Magill appeared to castigate their collective failure to demonstrate solidarity ahead of last week's murder. With the greatest respect to the cleric, this sort of crude 'lets-get-along-ism' may prompt spontaneous applause from those grieving and frustrated by a lifeless political system but it will not make all the impediments to agreement disappear. In the short term, it may just be enough to embarrass Stormont's leaders and Secretary of State Karen Bradley to make a sincere and prolonged effort to break the deadlock, however, a yearning for political stability alone will not suffice.

Stormont didn't collapse because of a ill-conceived, cack-handed renewable heat policy that operated in plain sight for years before public outrage made the MLAs take notice. Power-sharing was broken by a decade of mistrust and an acceptance that standards didn't have to match those of other political institutions because we were still emerging from a conflict situation. Photo opportunities and being lauded overseas for your record in securing peace can only paper over the cracks for so long.

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There are many reasons why we are presently not yet ready for a return to devolution, ranging from the quality of leadership to a civil service too keen to acquiesce to its political masters. Efforts to reform and re-establish the institutions should continue in genuine earnest, alongside a realisation that the world is transforming fast. However, to believe our differences can wished away in an instant is not only naive but it also builds up false expectations.