Murphy's Law looms with old firm back in business

"IT appeared to me that the Fianna Fail Ministers were behaving in a very disorganised manner. No one appeared to be in charge. At the meetings I attended, Ministers came in and out at will, with some being absent for periods."

Is it really just 2% years since that description of the behaviour of the senior figures in Fianna Fail, Bertie Ahern among them, was given to a Dail committee by the recent Attorney General, Eoghan Fitzsimons?

Since the people he was talking about embraced this description of their own state of mind with considerable enthusiasm, accepting confusion, tiredness, and even stupidity as acceptable alternatives to allegations of deliberate misconduct?

Since the Government Information Service was ringing in to RTE's Prime Time programme to insist that the blame for putting through the estimates for government expenditure while Fianna Fail and Labour were still in negotiation about the formation of a new government lay with Bertie Ahern, and not with Albert Reynolds? Since the party's hard man Brian Cowen was weepily declaring his loyalty to the same Albert?

They haven't gone away, you know. The old firm is back in business, promising five years of stability. Maybe they are banking on the Faith Of Our Fathers factor, that strange alchemy of time that transforms yesterday's hideous cliche's into today's smash hits.

Nostalgia can work miracles, but I am not convinced that the Return of the Living Dead will give the nation a warm glow of comfort.

Bertie Ahern's achievement in taking over a party in chaos and making it capable of winning office in less than three years is remarkable. In spite of some fatuous attempts to keep alive the old ideology of Fianna Fail as the National Movement rather than a political machine he has weaned the party off the pap of nationalist mysticism and concentrated its mind on what it has always been good at the gaining and wielding of power.

In spite of a share of the first preference vote that would have been a disaster for any of his predecessors, his ability to change the definition of Irish politics as a permanent fixture between Fianna Fail and the world has paid huge dividends in the shape of extra seats.

THE problem, though, is that it is very much a personal achievement. The rate of attrition at the top of Fianna Fail has been such that no one has taken the place of Ray MacSharry, Padraig Flynn and Moire Geoghegan Quinn. With a few exceptions like Mary O Rourke, Jim McDaid and Micheal Martin, the front bench,is shockingly mediocre.

Does anyone believe, for instance, that Brian Cowen will be able to deal sensitively with the consequences of his pledge to release all the files on the State's handling of the Brigid McCole case? That Charlie "Dirty Dozen" McCreevy is up to the job of converting an economic boom into social justice? That John O'Donoghue will have anything left to say about crime when his Zero Tolerance policy turns out to be complete nonsense, and the Department of Finance blocks his pledge to create 2,000 prison places?

This, remember, is the front bench that has already committed two astonishing unforced errors.

One is the promise to make Albert Reynolds a "peace envoy", "roving ambassador" or messiah at large the very uncertainty of what, he, is meant to be betrays the fuzziness of the thinking behind the idea. This will mean that the government will have four official voices on the peace process: a Taoiseach who has already proclaimed himself the leader of Irish nationalism, a PD leader who believes the Taoiseach should not be the leader of Irish nationalism, a minister for foreign affairs who will be dealing with the British and the Anglo Irish Conference, and a man who firmly believes he is the Only Begetter of the peace process, returning with a mission to put everything right and secure his place in history.

A better formula for combining Murphy's Law (anything that can go wrong will go wrong) with Whelehan's Law (anything that cannot go wrong will go wrong) is hard to imagine. The other self inflicted wound is John O'Donoghue's promise of another abortion referendum. During the election campaign Fianna Fail claimed that its discussion paper on the issue was almost ready for publication. When the issue arises, there will be huge pressure from the right wing of the party, from some Independents on whom Bertie Ahern will be dependent, and from the antiabortion lobby to hold a referendum on an amendment which would have to be even more crudely absolutist than the one passed in 1983.

WHEN that happens, Bertie Ahern will have two options. One is to refuse a referendum and hint that the PDs wouldn't wear it. The other is to go ahead and produce an amendment.

The first option would destabilise the coalition by giving a target for the anti PD sentiments present within Fianna Fail. The second would ensure the loss of the next election by reminding the fickle but crucial urban middle class that Fianna Fail is still the redneck party.

With an issue like abortion on which public opinion is irreconcilably divided, a catchall party like Fianna Fail literally cannot win.

There are other problems, too. However nice Bertie is to Mary Harney, the PDs have only one choice: radical or redundant, or to put it another way, botheration or obliteration. They can, and may, melt back into Fianna Fail's catchall centre ground, in which case they will cease to exist. Or they can continue to espouse a coherent right wing radicalism, in which case Bertie will find himself snuggling up on a bed of nails.

And bear in mind that two of the first items on the new government's agenda will be Charles Haughey's appearance at the Dunnes payments tribunal and the disclosure of financial contributions under the Electoral Act - issues on which the PDs will either have to storm the high moral ground or cede it forever.

It is all very well for Liz O'Donnell, for instance, to describe the events of the early 1990s as "ancient history", but the recent past is not so easily buried. If it was, Brendan Smyth would not have helped to bring down Albert Reynolds, Charles Haughey's would not be still the most potent name in Irish politics, and most of the Fianna Fail front bench would not be returning to office.

Unless he really is the most cunning, the most ruthless, the most devious of them all, Bertie Ahern will soon find that resurrection is one thing but ascending into heaven is another.