Sinn Féin support for the police in Northern Ireland will not cement the partition, Gerry Adams has said.
At the first in a series of public meetings organised by his party ahead of a crucial decision on policing last night, the Sinn Féin leader told republicans in Toome that the time was now right for them to get involved in policing because it would advance the cause of a united Ireland.
During a two hour debate the West Belfast MP told republicans opposed to his party's strategy for achieving a united Ireland to spell out clearly what they would do to get rid of British rule.
"You have said we are going to copperfasten partition by doing this," he noted. "That may be your view and that is a valid view but we do not believe we are going to copperfasten partition.
"Unionists do not believe we are going to copperfasten partition. I do not see unionists lining up to welcome us on this issue of policing. "But say for a moment you are right. I am prepared to surrender the microphone here. You tell me how you are going to get a united Ireland, how you are going to end British rule, how you are going to make peace between Orange Green and create a 32 county socialist republic.
"Sinn Féin has a strategy and are building a political party which with the democratic will of the people will take power in a united Ireland and bring about the type of socialist republic that we all here want to see."
The Toome meeting was the first in a series of public debates across the North ahead of Sinn Féin's January 28th ardfheis on policing.
Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams
Concerns were expressed by some members of the audience that if Sinn Féin got involved in policing structures it would become part of the state administering British rule.
Others expressed concern that the Sinn Féin leadership did not appear to have a clear strategy. However Mr Adams, who again repeated his call for direct meetings with dissident republican terror groups to persuade them to abandon the gun, warned opponents that they would advance their cause by remaining hurlers on the ditch. "Hurlers on ditches do not win games," the Sinn Fein leader said.
"Think big. Have some bloody confidence in yourself. "Did the British defeat us in the last 30 years? No they did not.
"Did the British put us down over the past 30 years? No they did not. "I stood with others, including people here at this meeting, on the front lines in some of the most repressive conditions but they did not beat us. "Remember that. Have confidence in yourselves — not in the British government, the Irish Government or the unionists. Have confidence in yourself at this time and in the Irish people."
Prime Minister Tony Blair and Taoiseach Bertie Ahern have identified Sinn Féin support for policing as being critical if there is to be any hope of power sharing this march.
The reverent Ian Paisley's democratic unionists had said they will not share power in a devolved government at Stormont without Sinn Fein signing up to support for the police, the courts and the rule of law.
Some republicans, however, view any move by Gerry Adams' party to endorse the PSNI as a betrayal of their ideals.
Veteran republican Laurence O'Neill did not take part in today's meeting but claimed outside the venue that Mr Adams had organised a staged managed event. Mr O'Neill said:" What is going on in here today is a shear farce. "It is a stage managed farce. All the dirty deals have already been done. All the decisions have been already taken. So what's the point of this fooling and deceiving and lying to the republican people?
"As far as I am concerned what is happening here is a group of people seeking power, and that power they have gained through the death of volunteers that fought and were assassinated, and they're dancing over the graves of the hunger strikers."