From Brexit to a United Ireland
The crisis surrounding Britain’s break with the EU has revitalized support for Irish unity. Yet with Brexit still hanging in the balance, Sinn Féin’s path to its historic goal is anything but clear.
Sinn Fein northern leader Michelle O’Neill addresses party members and the media as she attends the launch of the party’s European Parliament election manifesto and their candidate Martina Anderson at the Waterfront Hall on May 13, 2019 in Belfast, Northern Ireland. Charles McQuillan / Getty
The European elections are the only time when both parts of Ireland vote for a parliament that exercises authority — however limited — over the whole island. Sinn Féin is the only party with real political heft on both sides of the border: it currently has MEPs representing all four Irish constituencies, north and south (four seats out of fourteen in total).
If Brexit does go ahead, this will be the last all-Ireland vote for the European parliament. But Sinn Féin is hoping to use Britain’s departure from the EU as a way to secure a united Ireland, the party’s overriding political goal.
The success of its candidates in this week’s elections (held in the North on Thursday, and the rest of Ireland on Friday) will give us some idea of how Sinn Féin’s project is faring. However, the real test of its strategy is still to come.
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