'What the Papers Said' | Judgment Day: Donegal by-election verdict

NEWSPAPER editorials and analysis following Sinn Féin Senator Pearse Doherty’s stunning High Court victory on the Donegal South-West by-election delay must have made uncomfortable reading for Fianna Fáil but especially for their milksop Green Party partners in power.

Here’s some of what some of the print media said.

The Irish Times

Miriam Lord’s Dáil Sketch

That wasn’t too difficult now, was it? It has only taken 16 months and a trip to the High Court for the Government to name a date for the Donegal by-election.

Okay, so wild horses had to drag Cowen and his compadres through the courts to get them to grant the people of Donegal South-West their rights, but when you are wedded to democracy and cherish the Constitution in the way our Coalition does, that’s no big deal.

Editorial

If the High Court decision by Mr Justice Kearns concerning the Donegal South-West by-election came as a surprise to the Government, it only shows how arrogant and out of touch ministers have become.

Seeking to defend the indefensible, lawyers for the Government argued that if Sinn Féin’s Pearse Doherty won his case it would amount to a violent infringement of the principles of the separation of powers. Not so. On the contrary, had he lost, the rights of citizens to normal parliamentary representation could have become subject to Government diktat.

Irish News

Editorial

Sinn Féin Senator Pearse Doherty was fully entitled to conclude that yesterday’s ruling at the High Court in Dublin on the saga of the Donegal South-West by-election had dealt a ‘fatal blow’ to the Fianna Fáil/Green Party Coalition.

Irish Daily Mail

Front-page headline

LAST GASP OF A DISREPUTABLE GOVERNMENT

Cowen is finally forced to call by-election after shameful delaying tactics

Editorial

It seems that Mr Cowen and his fellow ministers know no shame. Yesterday, the High Court ruled that the Government has offended the spirit of the Constitution by failing to hold the long-awaited Donegal South-West by-election.

Yes, the High Court had to tell the Irish Government that its duty was to hold an election…

The people of three constituencies have been silenced for too long by the undemocratic manoeuvring of a Government that cannot tell right from wrong. Or at least doesn’t care what is right and what is wrong. And this undemocratic delay is wrong.

Irish Independent

Political Editor Fionnan Sheahan’s analysis

The by-elections were continually kicked to touch by Fianna Fáil and the Greens.

Only when Sinn Féin Senator Pearse Doherty took the strategically astute move of seeking to get the courts to force the Government’s hands did the Coalition begin to budge.

Lise Hand’s by-election sketch

Brian ‘Baldrick’ Cowen had a cunning plan – keep the by-elections on that trusty digital delay, an mear fada, until the spring when the recession would surely be over and the Celtic Tiger would have risen from the grave like Lazarus…

There’s a writ in his kitchen, what’s he gonna do?

Burning a fistful of taxpayers’ euros by appealing the decision to the Supreme Court would make them (if possible) even more unpopular. But neither was knocking on Donegal doors in the run-up to a savage Budget a pleasant option either.

And so Brian dug in his heels.

'Don't tell Donegal voters you didn't want to let them have a vote now'

Editorial

The spectacle of Tánaiste Mary Coughlan arguing that her own constituents should continue to be denied their rights would be too bizarre to contemplate…

Having procrastinated for so long and having handed Sinn Féin a real victory as well as a moral victory on a plate, it is quite possible that not even Packie Bonner could save the day for Fianna Fáil.

The Government should now set a date or dates early in the new year for the other three outstanding by-elections, even if it believes the results will lead to a general election.

Irish Sun

Editorial

Elections now

Cowen doesn’t want the by-elections held now as he knows Fianna Fáil would be thumped and his government would fall.

To deny the people their democratic right is a disgrace…

Where is your backbone, Biffo?

Irish Daily Mirror

Editorial

We need a new beginning and for that to take place there must be a general election.

Irish Daily Star

Editorial

How can this Government have the effrontery to continue in office after the utterly damning decision in the High Court yesterday?

Any government which behaves like this in order to hang on to power is just not fit to govern and is most definitely doing more damage than good.

It is an outrage that it took Sinn Féin to go to court and force the Government to confront this issue.

And then we have to witness the nauseating sight of the Greens turning on their Coalition partners and, in a shock move, demand a by-election immediately.

Have the Greens no principles at all?

If they have, then why don’t they do the honourable thing now and pull the plug completely?