Paisley says he could accept Sinn Féin first minister

FORMER FIRST minister and DUP leader Ian Paisley has said that he could accept a Sinn Féin first minister in the Northern Ireland Executive.

In an interview with the Belfast News Letter, Dr Paisley, known as Lord Bannside since his recent elevation to the British House of Lords, said: "I have to accept the will of the people".

He said that Sinn Féin did not become the majority party on his watch: “When I left off the leadership I left my party as having the largest mandate in Europe, the largest mandate in Westminster and the largest mandate in Stormont.”

He said that as a unionist he would continue to play his part in preventing Sinn Féin taking Stormont’s top post.

Despite calls from within the DUP and the Orange Order for unionist unity, Dr Paisley also made clear his opposition to the creation of a single unionist party. He said that “within Northern Ireland, unionist unity in the sense of one grand political party is, in my opinion, a non-runner”.

While he was in favour of improved inter-party relationships, Dr Paisley insisted that “limiting the choice” of the electorate was “not in the interests of the province but merely in the interests of those who want power. We need to be careful to protect what we have achieved by opening that choice for the unionist community and not let others who have failed to secure a mandate for what brand of unionism they are offering undermine it.”

Considering the future of Northern Ireland, Dr Paisley said he believed devolution had strengthened the union and he expressed his wish that by 2021 the Republic “will have rejoined the Commonwealth”.

A DUP spokesman said the claim that Ian Paisley would accept Martin McGuinness as first minister was “misleading”. He added that “the only people talking up the possibility of a Sinn Féin first minister are those who have an electoral interest in trying to divide unionism and turn it in on itself”.

In response to Dr Paisley’s remarks about unionist unity, the DUP said that “the mood within the unionist community is for closer co-operation between the pro-union parties. That is what we are earnestly working towards: meaningful co-operation to ensure maximum unionist representation in the Assembly.”