Northern Ireland once again sees history not being made

Northern Ireland experienced another day of not making history yesterday. The First Minister went missing, the deputy resigned and a totally useless executive was formed and disbanded in double quick time. Even Italian governments last longer.

Many described proceedings in and outside Parliament Buildings as farce, but for those who wanted to see implementation of the Belfast Agreement it went deeper and darker than that. Deputy first minister Seamus Mallon's dignified resignation reflected the mood.

For those who prayed for the destruction of the agreement it was, as Ian Paisley trumpeted, "a good day": there were no republicans in government - or at least they weren't in government for long. There were no unionists or nationalists either, but never mind.

A key image yesterday was the TV camera slowly zooming in on David Trimble's empty chair in the Assembly chamber. In that sense it certainly had elements of theatrical farce - empty chairs, politicians coming out one door when they should have been going in another, politicians being appointed to ministries they could never hold, a useless executive with an absent First Minister and a resigning deputy first minister. When David Trimble should have been entering the chamber he was six miles away, exiting party headquarters in Glengall Street to tell reporters he had better things to do than take a drive to Stormont.

First out the door of the party HQ with Mr Trimble's Assembly team was Peter Weir, a young man who understandably was beaming with delight. Not only had he helped engineer the sidelining of the agreement when it should have been in full throttle, but here he was, an anti-Belfast Agreement unionist, back in the party's embrace. And who was on television batting on behalf of the UUP's position? Another anti-agreement party member, Jeffrey Donaldson. Meanwhile, Mr Trimble was saying the agreement could still be saved. Figure that.

Ian Paisley and Robert McCartney blamed "IRA/Sinn Fein". Sinn Fein, the SDLP, Alliance, the Women's Coalition and the Progressive Unionist Party blamed David Trimble. David Trimble blamed the British government.

Mo Mowlam blamed nobody in particular. It was not "a day for recriminations", she said on a day of recriminations. The first minister-designate appointed was Mark Durkan, proposed by John Hume to the department of finance and personnel. Mr Durkan, at just about an hour, was the North's longest-serving member of the executive.

In years to come pub quizzes will ask the names of the members of the Northern Ireland government that was in office even more briefly than the briefest of the numerous post-war Italian administrations. For the record those ministers were: Mark Durkan, Bairbre de Brun, Sean Farren, Martin McGuinness, Brid Rodgers, Pat Doherty, Joe Hendron, Denis Haughey, Mary Nelis, and Alban Maginness.