“This represents a truly historic change for the north of Ireland and the island of Ireland as a whole,” she said in a statement to The Washington Post.
O’Neill called it a “good day for democracy” and noted that the restoration of power would “respect the results” of the May 2022 election. In this election, Sinn Féin won the largest number of seats in Parliament for the first time and gained the right to vote. He will hold the first ministerial post under Northern Ireland’s delicate power-sharing arrangement.
But Mr O’Neill also insisted he would be “a prime minister for everyone”. That means unionists and republicans, Protestants and Catholics, those who want a “united Ireland” and those who want to remain “forever Britain.” middle number).
Earlier this week, Sinn Féin president of the Republic of Ireland and opposition leader Mary Lou McDonald declared that Irish unity was “within reach”.
Mr O’Neill appeared to avoid such language this week, with experts saying the prospect of a united Ireland was still a long way off and was more of a medium-term project than immediate.
But there is no doubt that the political landscape across Ireland is changing.
Trade unionists have held great power here for decades, proudly proclaiming Northern Ireland to be one of the four countries of the United Kingdom, along with England, Scotland and Wales.
It is trade unionists who have been boycotting the government for the past two years. Clearly, their dissatisfaction was with the post-Brexit trade deal. However, many suspected that Sinn Féin was unwilling to accept a more dominant role.
So for the past 730 days, there has been no functioning government in Stormont House, Northern Ireland’s center of power. Although there was no executive or parliament, members continued to collect two-thirds of their salaries.
The gift shop and cafeteria remained open. Elementary school students visited. But unelected officials were left to keep the lights on while avoiding important decisions.
A milestone occurred earlier this week. Presented by Jeffrey Donaldson He said his Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) had struck a deal with Chancellor Rishi Sunak’s government to adjust some trade and customs arrangements for goods across the Irish Sea.
Brexit experts have described the changes as minor but important to unionists, who say the check and customs declaration requirements will drive a wedge between Britain and Northern Ireland. , which it claims will draw the North deeper into the All-Ireland economy.
When the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland were both part of the European Union’s common market, trade was not an issue. But with Brexit, negotiators had to find a way to protect the integrity of the EU’s market without creating a visible border on the island of Ireland. Doing so could undermine the Good Friday peace agreement that ended three decades of sectarian and state violence known as the Troubles. ”
Mr Donaldson claimed victory in this week’s trade deal, saying it would “defend our position within the EU”.
The Good Friday Agreement, brokered in part by the United States, ushered in the modern era of devolved power-sharing in Northern Ireland. There is no winner-take-all here today.
Officially, there is no power difference between Mr O’Neill and the new deputy first minister, likely the DUP’s Emma Little Pengelly. They will be equals and co-leaders. While some may be the first to shake hands with visiting world leaders, they share a mission.
But one person is called a deputy, and that’s important here.
Social Democratic and Labor MP Matthew O’Toole said: “As with everything in Northern Ireland, having Michelle O’Neill as prime minister is almost symbolic.
And he cautioned that “just because something is symbolic doesn’t make it any less important.”
Siobra Aiken, a lecturer at Queen’s University Belfast, called Mr O’Neill’s appointment as a pastor a “huge change”.
She said that when the island was partitioned in 1921, “Northern Ireland’s infrastructure was specifically designed to prevent this from happening. was founded in.”
When former IRA leader turned peace negotiator Martin McGuinness became Sinn Féin’s first deputy first minister in 2007, unionists accused him of having blood on his hands. It wasn’t unusual.
With elections to be held in the south next year, Mr Aiken said: “Sinn Féin will soon be in power in both jurisdictions on this island.”
Belfast-based feminist historian Margaret Ward said the moment was “huge in terms of the evolution of Sinn Féin” and was also important in the evolution of Northern Ireland’s government.
“When I was growing up, Stormont was irrelevant because it was a very middle-class establishment that was male, trade unionist, and didn’t have the interests of the working class at heart, whether they were Catholic or Protestant. Because it was,” she said. “For almost half a century, you can count on two hands the number of women who have held elected office.”
Mr. O’Neill’s rise is remarkable. A Catholic from a rural county, she became a mother at the age of 16 and has often spoken of her troubled youth. Today, she is a bright talent with a long political record, active on social media and popular with selfie-seeking young people.
She comes from a Republican family. Her father was imprisoned as an IRA member during the unrest and later entered politics as a local Sinn Féin MP. Her uncle was the head of the US Republican fundraising group Noraid, which the US government accused of funneling money into buying IRA guns. Noraid leaders deny this.
For Jim Allister, the only member of the Legislative Assembly from the traditional Unionist Voice party, O’Neill has not distanced himself sufficiently from IRA violence. After denouncing this week’s tweaked trade deal by fellow unionists as “nothing but fantasy and hype”, he told the Post he would return to parliament on Saturday but would not be able to choose the prime minister. He said he was against it.
“Michelle O’Neill is the woman who told the people of Northern Ireland that there is no alternative to IRA slaughter and genocide. She is justifying those acts,” he said. “So if she thinks it was right and necessary to kill and slaughter innocent people, then I think she is completely unfit to hold this high office, or any democratic office.”
In 2022, O’Neill was asked by the BBC about IRA violence during the unrest.
“I don’t think any Irish person woke up one morning and thought conflict was a good idea. But war has come to Ireland,” she said.
She continued: “I don’t think there was any other choice at the time, but thankfully we now have an alternative to conflict and that is the Good Friday Agreement.”
Alex Muskie, 72, has been Speaker of the Northern Ireland Assembly since 2020 and was the first Sinn Féin member to serve as Mayor of Belfast from 2002 to 2003. He is expected to step down once a new chair is elected on Saturday.
“Michelle O’Neill’s symbolism as the first republican prime minister will not be forgotten by many people. To me, that is a positive thing,” he said.
Muskie said she still hopes to one day live in a united Ireland.
“I want to have the dignity of my own political destination and the sovereignty of my homeland,” he said. “I am working on the assumption that it will be introduced.”