O’Neill ‘will not be stepping aside under any circumstances’, says Sinn Féin
Sinn Féin has rejected a DUP call for Michelle O’Neill to step aside as Stormont Deputy First Minister over her attendance at an IRA funeral that drew hundreds of people on to the streets.
First Minister Arlene Foster wrote to her partner in government on Thursday telling Ms O’Neill to stand down pending a police and Assembly investigation into the scenes at Bobby Storey’s funeral in west Belfast on Tuesday.
Sinn Féin made clear that Ms O’Neill would be going nowhere.
A party spokesman said: “Michelle O’Neill will not be stepping aside as Deputy First Minister under any circumstances.”
Thursday’s scheduled joint press conference on the coronavirus emergency with Mrs Foster and Ms O’Neill has been cancelled.
But DUP sources have indicated there is no appetite within the party to pull down the institutions in the way the late Martin McGuinness did when he quit as a joint head of government in January 2017.
On Wednesday, Mrs Foster urged Ms O’Neill to apologise and make amends for what happened at Monday’s funeral in west Belfast.
The Deputy First Minister declined and defended her actions, insisting she acted within Covid-19 rules and guidance.
She differentiated between the management of the funeral cortege and service and scenes along the route when hundreds gathered to watch the procession pass. Ms O’Neill insisted that was outside of her control.
I am satisfied that my actions at Bobby Storey’s funeral are in line with public health advice
— Michelle O’Neill (@moneillsf) July 1, 2020
These petty attempts to political point score must end and the Storey family giving space to grieve
My thoughts are with Bobby’s much loved partner Teresa and the Storey family today pic.twitter.com/CQ445OBPjQ
Senior DUP figures met on Thursday to discuss their next step following Ms O’Neill’s remarks.
Afterwards, the DUP’s Westminster leader Jeffrey Donaldson said: “I think now is the time to step up and demonstrate respect and integrity.
“The law on these matters is clear and what happened at that funeral has sent out a very, very bad message to people in Northern Ireland.”
He told BBC Radio Ulster: “In light of the failure of Sinn Féin yesterday to grasp the opportunity to apologise, it is our view that the Deputy First Minister must now step back from her role while these matters are investigated by the PSNI.
.@J_Donaldson_MP speaking earlier today: pic.twitter.com/BVGvRtf19N
— DUP (@duponline) July 2, 2020
“We will be asking the standards authorities in the Assembly to examine whether those MLAs who attended the funeral broke the code of conduct for MLAs, and we will also be asking the PSNI to specifically investigate any potential regulatory breaches by executive ministers including the Deputy First Minister.”
Earlier on Thursday, SDLP leader Colum Eastwood called for Ms O’Neill to step aside and allow her actions to be examined by Assembly standards authorities.
The Ulster Unionist Party and Alliance Party have also called for her to stand down.
Police are investigating potential breaches of lockdown rules.
Ms O’Neill has insisted the funeral cortege was limited to 30, while social distancing inside the church was “exemplary”. It is understood that more than 100 people were inside the church.
On Wednesday, Ms O’Neill acknowledged that a selfie taken at the cemetery of her posing close to two men, one of whom had his arm on her shoulder, “should not have happened”.
She said the photo happened in a “blink of an eye” as she was leaving the graveside.
Mr Eastwood told Radio Ulster: “I don’t want any more instability, I argued for three years for the Assembly to come back, but equally I don’t think that anybody should be above the law.
“The point isn’t that she accidentally broke some obscure piece of guidance, she broke the guidance that she set out, that she argued for, that she stood over and made the case for, rightly and sensibly. But then decided to set that all aside because I think, for Sinn Fein, they believe that there is one rule for them and one rule for everyone else, and that it is always movement first with them, and I think that is very hard for the public to take in.
“I couldn’t tell you how many people have contacted me furious about this, and remembering all of the sacrifices that they made during the most difficult days of this pandemic.”
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