Sinn Féin president Gerry Adams has dismissed as electioneering Taoiseach Bertie Ahern's insistence that he would not enter into coalition with Sinn Féin after the next general election.
"It's the election, stupid, if I may borrow a phrase," Mr Adams said yesterday when asked to respond to Mr Ahern's emphatic remarks at the weekend that he would not go into Government with Sinn Féin after the election.
Mr Adams, reinforcing a similar response by Martin McGuinness on Monday, said he was not surprised by the Taoiseach's statement, which he portrayed as designed to boost Fianna Fáil's general election prospects.
"It's not a question of will Fianna Fáil share power with Sinn Féin. It's a question of will Sinn Féin go into government with Fianna Fáil," he said at Stormont yesterday where he launched a party paper arguing that direct rule is damaging the North's public services and its economy.
Sinn Féin would only enter into coalition government based on party ardfheis approval and based on a programme of government that dealt with issues such as inequality and offered a strategy for achieving Irish unity, he added.
Mr Adams said that Sinn Féin was not in any way "meek" in seeking to enter government in the South and re-enter government in the North. "That is the raison d'être of our existence. We don't want to do that to have bums on ministerial seats. We want to do it because we want to bring about change," he said.
The Taoiseach and other politicians and commentators have criticised Sinn Féin's economic policies, particularly an expected policy paper urging tax rises, including an increase in corporation tax from 12.5 per cent to 17 per cent.
Mr Adams, however, defended the party's economic approach. He said party policy was to prevent privatisation of public services. While the Government had its largest economic surplus, it had "decrepit" services. "Our position is very straightforward. The wealth should be used to provide those public services and not to reward big business and those who may be cronies of the more conservative parties."
Mr Adams is scheduled to make what he called a "keynote" speech in Kells, Co Meath, tomorrow where he is likely to expand on his initial response yesterday to the Taoiseach's statement about coalition.
He said that the Sinn Féin discussion paper, Counting the Cost of Direct Rule and Putting it Right, which he launched yesterday, demonstrated that direct rule failed at "every conceivable social, political and economic level".
The DUP, in particular, by refusing to engage with Sinn Féin to end direct rule, was damaging the interests of the people in the North. "This is a challenge for us all. Unionists have walked away from every initiative aimed at restoring the institutions. Their refusal to engage and agree a way forward has penalised everyone, not just republicans. The question is - how long will the DUP allow direct rule ministers to take decisions to the detriment of the people in the North?"
