Statement by the Communist Party of Ireland – 18 June 2021
The resignation of Edwin Poots as leader of the Democratic Unionist Party, and the implosion of the DUP, should not come as a surprise to anyone with a modicum of understanding of the entrenched anti-democratic nature of unionism and the historical manoeuvrings of the British Imperialism and its colonial legacy, to suit its material interests.
The DUP seem oblivious to the shifting position of the British ruling class as a result of Brexit and the Protocol, and fully blinkered, forcing Poots’ resignation for being too soft on the Irish question, they have managed to entrench themselves and their followers even deeper into a British national identity which is not reciprocated by the former empire, as British interests in Ireland constantly wane.
It is time to end the charade that Britain has carefully nurtured: i.e. that the British themselves are neutral and that it has no self-serving interests in continuing to control the North of Ireland either directly from Westminster or indirectly through Stormont devolution, when clearly they are a central part of the problem.
They have used and manipulated unionism as a vehicle for its own strategic imperialist ends for over a century and this resignation, with all the fanfare it has caused, is indicative of the creation of a backward political ideology, engulfed in reaction and hatred, wedded to the ideals of a British empire with its bloody colonial and imperialist legacy.
This latest crisis is just one in a long line of attempts at finding an “internal” solution within the anti-democratic sectarian statelet that is “Northern Ireland.” The very nature of the six-county statelet was created on a sectarian head count imposed by the British state to thwart the long demand and struggle of the people of Ireland for an independent national democracy, for sovereignty and control by the people of Ireland.
What is clearly obvious is that partition has failed all the people of Ireland and has left a great scar and a bitter legacy of hatred, division, institutionalised sectarian discrimination, violence and repression resulting in countless deaths. This bitter harvest has been borne heaviest by the working class and working people and so the solution must be sought within and by the working class and working people. A legacy that cannot be wished away needs to be confronted and challenged in an open and honest fashion by appealing to solutions that advance the material conditions of the working class, by forwarding an all-Ireland strategy to heal those class divisions, with partition being the central one.
The CPI affirm that now is the time for the British government to declare its intention to withdraw in an orderly fashion from Ireland and to finally end its colonial relationship with Ireland. It is also clear that it is in the best interests of British democracy itself to end its anti-democratic interference in the affairs of our people as well as of other nations.
Britain needs to declare that it is disengaging and to set in motion the necessary negotiations to ensure an orderly departure and to meet its long-term economic and financial commitments to the people of the Six Counties.
The Irish establishment must also be forced to engage and to pursue a British disengagement, for they have also for nearly a century hidden behind the language of neutrality and “honest brokers” to mask their complicity with continued British occupation. Unsurprisingly this policy suited their dependency on British Imperialism and bolstered their own parasitic economic and political interests, to the detriment of all the people of Ireland.
The analysis of the CPI leads to the conclusion that there can never be a lasting and peaceful internal political settlement between what is contested between independent and occupying power. The six counties, as constituted through partition, is neither stable nor democratic, and is in danger of erupting into further violence and bloodshed. The only solution which can achieve the paramount goal of peace is through the establishment of a new unitary all-Ireland democratic state.
It is time for working people to organise and put forward their own demands and what type of united Ireland is in their best interests. The cobbling together of two failed economic and political entities is not a solution to the many problems that working people face, only a unitary national democratic state built upon absolute equality, unity of our class and on economic and political democracy and social justice.
