Robinson steps aside, puts ‘gatekeeper’ in zombie Executive

Posted by Jim on September 10, 2015

In a dramatic day in Belfast, DUP leader Peter Robinson has backed away
from a threat to immediately collapse the Six County Executive, instead
opting to step aside temporarily and withdraw all his Ministers,
leaving one.

The sole DUP Minister in the apparently doomed Executive will now be
his substitute, Arlene Foster, acting as both First Minister and
Finance Minister.

The DUP move will not bring about an immediate collapse of the northern
institutions. Executive departments will still function under the
temporary arrangements, but the Executive will not meet.

Robinson had urged the British government to immediately suspend the
institutions after a Stormont committee refused to adjourn (recess) the
Assembly. However, the British Direct Ruler Theresa Villiers has so far
refused to take that step.

With the exception of Mrs Foster, the DUP’s ministers have all signed
their letters of resignation. It is understood that the resignations
will take at least seven days to come into effect.

According to Robinson, he has “stepped aside but not technically
resigned”. He said Foster will remain as a ‘gatekeeper’ in the
executive until the resignation process is completed — ostensibly to
prevent nationalists from accessing Stormont funds.

“Arlene remaining in post allows us to ensure that no irrational
financial decisions are taken by other parties in what might appear to
be the last number of days of this assembly,” he said.

Robinson’s motivation for sustaining the Executive, even in the short
term, remains unclear. He could have acted to immediately collapse the
institutions by tendering his own resignation, but unexpectedly
declined to do so.

At a press conference this evening, he said he still backed devolution,
but it had been pushed “to the “brink”.

“Local ministers making local decisions is best for Northern Ireland,”
the DUP leader said.

“The failure of the SDLP and Sinn Fein to implement the Stormont House
Agreement, together with the assessment from the Chief Constable of the
involvement of IRA members in murder, the continued existence of the
IRA, and the arrests that followed, has pushed devolution to the
brink.”

Villiers later confirmed that she would not take the decision to move
towards suspension and called for all parties to work together.

She said it had been a “bad day”, but “there has been a number of such
bad days”.

One hopeful sign for the Stormont administration this evening was the
release from PSNI custody this evening of Sinn Fein’s northern
chairman, Bobby Storey, whose arrest helped to fuel the latest cycle in
the crisis.

Mr Storey had been arrested in connection with the death last month of
east Belfast man Kevin McGuigan. Two other senior republicans arrested
with Storey, as well as a 50-year-old woman arrested this morning,
still remain in custody.