Stakeholder

After a rerun, the Republic – like the ‘man from Del Monte’ – has said a resounding Yes to the Lisbon Treaty. It’s one of those rare moments when one’s faith in human nature is justified.

The rag-tag bunch of ultra-right-wing misfits, Catholic reactionaries, loony left malcontents and foreign-inspired business interests – who grossly misled the Republic’s electorate through fear, unsubstantiated claims and unfounded scaremongering throughout the first referendum – were well and truly routed.

Brian Cowen will be feeling more relieved than victorious but given the current state of Fianna Fail a win is a win. In fairness to the taoiseach his response hit the right note in acknowledging the role of other political parties, civic and business organisations in securing a positive outcome in the referendum.

If truth was told, the Irish pro-European lobby was overwhelmingly complacent in the last referendum and took a Yes outcome for granted. But nothing in life should be taken for granted and even less so in politics.

There has never been any doubt that the majority of Irish people are pro-European. The nonsense spouted by No campaigners that this was a victory for the so-called establishment is rubbish. All the main representative organisations in the Republic are generally pro-European. That’s not an ‘establishment’ view but a reflection of the majority will of the Irish people.

Naturally, the disgruntled and disaffected will always regurgitate the same time old tripe that they ‘wuz robbed, governor’. Who can forget Gerry Adams in 1992 fuming about his unseating by the electorate of west Belfast and accusing all non-Sinn Fein voters in the constituency of ‘stealing’ the election from him?

Like the EU elections, the referendum demonstrates that Sinn Fein is more of a north-eastern political phenomenon than a national organisation.

Sinn Fein’s position on Europe in Ireland is nothing short of schizophrenic, depending on which part of the border one votes on. While the majority of Sinn Fein voters in the south were obviously against Lisbon, their northern comrades, if permitted to vote, are likely to have voted Yes.

While the EU remains a vital funder of many of the ‘community-based’ schemes that benefit large sections of Sinn Fein’s northern voter base, the EU largesse in the south was more wisely spent on infrastructure and education which has left their citizens better equipped to deal with an economic downturn. The industries attracted by this investment were in the ICT and pharma sectors and are actually performing well in the Republic – even through the recession.

Despite the barrage of negative media commentary, the Republic is better placed through its wealth and job-creation schemes to weather the recession. Last week the national savings index marked a 30-year high.

It’s only the sectarian bean count that passes for elections in Northern Ireland that denies the true pro-European sentiments of the majority of northern nationalists.

Nevertheless Sinn Fein holds that mandate despite being less than enthusiastic Europeans and it was not stolen from the SDLP. The latter is just incapable of convincing the majority of nationalists that topping the sectarian poll is a poor barometer of economic well-being.

Unfortunately for the SDLP, the ‘iron curtain’ of sectarianism appears as impregnable as the 13 miles of 30-foot high ‘peace walls’ that divide Belfast.

At least in the south the majority of those elected to Europe share a pro-European vision.

During the Second World War the American president Franklin D Roosevelt, despairing of the south’s ill-judged policy of neutrality, wrote to his ambassador in Ireland saying: “During all these years it has been a pity that Ireland has lived in a dream under the rule of a dreamer.

“They do not know the facts of life and it may take a rude awakening to teach them.”

While a world war did not awaken the south from its slumber, a world economic crisis appears to have done the trick. An Ireland outside of the EU would reduce it to an Iceland – a country now belatedly trying to break into the EU family.

It’s ironic that Sinn Fein in Ireland now shares common ground on Europe with Traditional Unionist Voice, the United Kingdom Independence Party and the British National Party.

Their anti-Lisbon sentiments are also shared with the DUP and Cameron’s Conservative and Unionist Force.

Yet there appears to be no reward on the policing and justice front in return for such political unity on Europe. Perhaps Boris Johnson will guest appear at the next Sinn Fein ard fheis.