Ahern hoping to witness 'truly historic day'
It will be a truly historic day when Ian Paisley and Martin McGuinness are nominated as First and Deputy First Minister of Northern Ireland, Taoiseach Bertie Ahern said today.
Although admitting an agreement was not done and dusted yet, the Taoiseach said he was hopeful that the first major step of the process will have taken place within weeks with Sinn Féin and the DUP both saying yes to the new deal.
The move would result in the forming of an historic power-sharing executive in the North within six months.
"As we negotiated and understand, when it comes to the decision of the assembly meeting to nominate the first minister, which will be Dr Paisley, and the deputy first minister, which will be Martin McGuinness, Dr Paisley will say yes, Sinn Féin will say yes, and all the other parties will say yes," he said.
"That will be truly a historic day."
Mr Ahern said throughout the three days of talks at St Andrews, all the parties were involved in discussing all elements of the proposed plan.
The Northern parties have until November 10 to respond to the plan, with a first minister and deputy first minister to be nominated on November 24.
If the parties concerned are then prepared to follow the series of carefully choreographed moves on policing and sharing power, a fully functioning executive could be in place by March 26 next year.
Mr Ahern said remarkable progress had already been made at St Andrews in getting all the party leaders and negotiators around one table together.
He admitted though that like all negotiations, you can never be 1,000% certain that there will be no difficulties.
"You can't say done and dusted, but we have a clear line now that brings us to the spring time and bring us to an inclusive executive for Northern Ireland," continued the Taoiseach.
"Hopefully everybody, including the governments, can live up to what we have agreed and see it through over the next few months."
Mr Ahern said party leaders now had to work at their grass roots to move forward.
"Political leadership in every country is about coming to a conclusion about the right thing to do and then being able to have the ability, and the ability of the leadership which can be any amount of people, to be able to bring that forward," he told RTÉ Radio's This Week show.
"That is the job of a political leader in every democracy. There is a time when people have to come to that judgment."
