................................................................................ ON THE RECORD RECORDED FROM TRANSMISSION BBC-1 DATE: 28.1.96
................................................................................ JOHN HUMPHRYS: Good afternoon. Sinn Fein says the Northern Ireland peace process is now in danger because Mr Major wants an election there. We'll be asking if it can be rescued. ******** HUMPHRYS: And, now, to Northern Ireland. What's happened this week seems to prove the old adage that in THAT part of the world it's always one step forward and two steps back. The Mitchell Commission which was set up to get rid of ONE roadblock standing in the way of permanent peace has done its job and produced its report. Now there's another roadblock. Mr Major says he wants there to be elections in Northern Ireland before there can be all-Party talks. The Unionists agree - it was their idea. Sinn Fein is implacably opposed. But what does that really mean? Martin McGuinness is one of the leading figures in Sinn Fein. Mr McGuinness what have you got against elections? MARTIN MCGUINNESS: Well, we've absolutely nothing against elections. Sinn Fein is not afraid of elections. We have over the course of the recent while proved our mandate consistently, and I think that all of us here accept that if there were to be elections, then the three major Unionist Parties and the the two nationalist Parties would undoubtedly be returned with roughly the same mandates as they have at the moment. The question really isn't who's afraid of elections, the question really is who's afraid of negotiations, and I think the events of this week have clearly shown that the British Prime Minister John Major and the leader of the Ulster Unionist Party David Trimble are afraid of negotiations. HUMPHRYS: So, will you not take part in those elections? MCGUINNESS: Well, I think that that's an option which will have to be considered by the Sinn Fein leadership along with others
and we will do that in due course. HUMPHRYS: So you've not set your face against it? MCGUINNESS: Well, I think that what we have to do is have a discussion about it. Clearly what we're seeing here is a very determined attempt by the British Prime Minister and the Unionists to yet again put off and delay and stall all-Party peace negotiations, and I think that in the context of us being seventeen months into a process that is quite disgraceful and quite cowardly, and very selfish indeed. HUMPHYRS: So when are you going to reach a decision? When will you tell us whether you're going to take part in those elections or not? MCGUINNESS: Well, the Sinn Fein National Executive will meet and discuss that and in due course we will make our decision known. HUMPHYRS: When? When is that likely to be? MCGUINNESS: Well, I think it'll happen in the course of the next few weeks. HUMPHRYS: If you don't take part in those elections, then of course you'll hear -- have already heard from the Unionists amongst others, saying: you're scared because you're afraid you'll be kicked out. MCGUINNESS: No. Quite clearly, Sinn Fein's mandate will be quite solid in any election, and I think the Unionists know that full well. What the Unionists are trying to do is buy more time. The question I repeat is not who's afraid of elections, but who is afraid of negotiations? And, Mr Trimble who has proved himself to be quite a selfish Unionist Leader has also proved himself to be afraid to sit at the negotiating table with the rest of us. HUMPHRYS: What you could do of course is you could take part in the elections and then if you were so opposed to the assembly and the thing that it willlead to, you could say: Well, we'll boycott the assembly. MCGUINNESS: Well I think all of these options will have to be considered in due course, and our national leadership will consider all of these matters, but in reality what we all have to do is recognise at the end of a week in which a very determined attempt was made by the British Prime Minister, and by the Leader of the Ulster Unionist Party to kill all hope and be silent we must recognise that a job of work still has to be done. We must not become dispirited, we must not become demoralised or downhearted, and we clearly have to challenge and expose the negativity of the British Government and the Unionists to the international community. HUMPHRYS: And the way to do that you believe is to have these all-Party talks, and the surefire way, the absolute certain way of getting those all-Party talks, without even having to decommission any weapons before them, is to take part in the elections. MCGUINNESS: Well, what you have to clearly
understand is the strategies and the tactics being employed here by the British Government and the Unionists. Everyone in this island is absolutely disgusted with the behaviour of the British Prime Minister and his cowardice. They clearly see that what is happening here is a British Prime Minister attempting to buy Unionist votes in order to stay in power, and of course in the grand plan of where we go from there in relation to the next British General Election it's also obvious that the Conservative Party are going to fight that election, and one of the major items in their manifesto will be the non-break-up of what they call the United Kingdom. So, John Major is showing himself to be what he really is, and that is a very dedicated and committed Unionist. HUMPHRYS: Yeah, but in a sense it doesn't matter what his motives are. What matters is what you would get out of these elections, and Mr Major, he's made it absolutely clear again in an interview this morning, that what you would get is the all-Party talks that you want. So therefore it's very very hard to see why you should not be sitting there this morning and saying: Alright, we don't like the idea of elections. We think it's maybe time-wasting or whatever else you may think it is, but it means we will get what we have always said we wanted which is all-Party talks. MCGUINNESS: That is not necessarily the case. What we've seen over the course of the last eighteen months and even for some months before it is the British Prime Minister and his representatives speaking with a forked tongue. So, Republicans are very cautious when we hear these comments from the British Prime Minister. The Unionists have laid their cards on the table. They believe that the establishment of an assembly or a convention will deal with only the issue of what they call the decommissioning or what we call the surrender of the IRA. So, in reality, nationalists are looking at the prospect of the establishment of an elected body in the North with some considerable dismay because of the tactics and the strategies being employed by the British government and the Unionists. And, the Unionists of course have received considerable support from the British Prime Minister in their intransigence. And it's also very important to point out and I think this will maybe be lost on people, that in the course of the last eighteen months we have not had one major statement from any senior member of the British Government exhorting the Unionists to sit at the negotiating table with the political representatives of Irish nationalism on this island. HUMPHRYS: If you don't like that particular path that - clearly you don't - that Mr Major's outlined, then what about the Commission's path that they have set out - Senator Mitchell's path, and the six principles that he has strongly recommended that you adopt. Now, are you going to accept all of those six principles? MCGUINNESS: Well, the British Prime Minister has effectively placed the Mitchell Report, the Mitchell Commission Report into the dustbin. So, it's all very hypothetical and academic at this stage. What we have to do is recognise that we have a British Prime Minister who nailed his colours to the mast in the course of this week on Wednesday afternoon when he said there were only two ways into talks with Sinn Fein. He said: One: there must be an actual decommissioning or surrender by the IRA, and Two: Sinn Fein must take part in elections. So effectively the British government have dumped the Mitchell Report and for many people it has become water under the bridge. HUMPHRYS: But you've never allowed the British Government in the past to write your agenda for you, so what you can do here, you say Mr Major has put that in the dustbin, you can say we're taking it out of the dustbin. Mr Major set up, along with the Dublin Government this international commission. We will take those recommendations, we will put them on the table and we will endorse them in the way that this international and independent commission said we should. MCGUINNESS: Well, Sinn Fein's position on the Mitchell body was that we were prepared to be constructive in relation to the Mitchell Report. HUMPHRYS: Not still prepared? MCGUINNESS: What we are saying here and what we are up against is a British Prime Minister which is saying quite clearly that he is being supported by the leader of the Ulster Unionist Party. That it really doesn't matter what Sinn Fein does- HUMPHRYS: Well- MCGUINNESS: -in relation to the Mitchell Report. They are not going to go down that road. The road that they have now paved out for themselves is the road to an elected Party, a return to an assembly or a convention which they hope will be a springboard to a full blown assembly in the North of Ireland. Sinn Fein is totally and absolutely opposed to the concept of an internal settlement within the North. HUMPHRYS: You keep telling me what Mr Major wanted, you keep telling me what the Unionists want, but you're not telling me what you now are prepared to do. You're avoiding that issue all the time. Are you prepared to accept those recommendations, those six principles that were enunciated by the Mitchell Commission? That's a straightforward subject to deal with. You think they're important, you had trust in the Mitchell Commission, you said so. MCGUINNESS: Yeah and I have no problem dealing with it at all. The reality, and we have to face the reality, is that we're having this conversation against the background of the British Prime Minister effectively dumping into the bin a report which he jointly commissioned with the Dublin Government in the first place. I will tell you what I want, I will tell you what I believe all the people of this island want. I will tell you what the international community expects. They expect to see all the Parties sitting at the negotiating table, dealing with all of the issues at the heart of this conflict. HUMPHRYS: Right, and that's- MCGUINNESS: So what we have seen in the course of the last week is a British Prime Minister attempting to kill hope and the failure, if there is a failure in all of this, is a failure of Mr Major, not our failure. HUMPHRYS: And if and when you get around that table, again Senator Mitchell has said what you ought to do, once you get into those talks then there ought to be some decommissioning of weapons, do you accept that? MCGUINNESS: Well Sinn Fein's position has been made quite clear in the submission which we made to Mr Mitchell prior to the announcement of his document. And, we have said that we believe that it is possible to bring about the removal of all of the guns, not just the guns of the IRA but the guns of the British Army, the RUC and over one hundred and fifty thousand weapons held in the hands of Unionists as a part of a negotiated settlement. What we have to do is apply the rules of conflict resolution as they pretain in other parts of the world and recognise that what we have to get into negotiation for is to remove all of the injustices, all of the discrimination, all of the inequalities that have existed in this state since it was founded in the early 1920s. HUMPHRYS: Mr Major has said, the British Government has said, that they no longer have a selfish interest in Northern Ireland. Are you saying that they've now changed that view, that they do? MCGUINNESS: Absolutely. I think that the course of the last eighteen months has clearly shown that the British Government are acting in their own self interest. Number One: to stay in power by buying the Unionist votes and Number Two, clearly, making in the course of recent... made it quite clear that one of the central platforms in their manifesto at the next British General Election will be the non-breakup of what they call the United Kingdom, the devolution for Scotland, an issue which they intend to fight out with the British Labour Party. So, what the British Government have done is clearly put their own self interest over and above the quest for peace and a negotiated settlement on this island. HUMPHRYS: Martin McGuinness, thank you. ...oooOOOooo...