Sarkozy Call for Second EU Vote Provokes Storm in Ireland
July 17th, 2008If at first you don’t vote the way We want, try, try again.
Via: AFP:
Irish politicians reacted angrily Wednesday after French President Nicolas Sarkozy suggested Ireland should hold a second referendum on the EU’s new treaty, after rejecting it last month.
Irish voters dealt a blow to the European Union last month by rejecting the Lisbon Treaty in the only popular vote on the text anywhere in the 27-nation bloc.
According to deputies who attended a meeting with Sarkozy Tuesday, he said that the Irish would “have to re-vote”, despite 53 percent opposition.
A key adviser to the French president said later on Wednesday that Sarkozy could ask Ireland to hold a second referendum on the document, but with some minor changes.
“One of the solutions would be indeed to eventually ask the Irish to re-vote, but probably not on a text that would be exactly the same,” said Henri Guaino in an interview to French television.
“We’ll see,” he added.
Guaino stressed that Sarkozy’s remarks, widely reported in the press, were “not an official statement from the president.”
Sarkozy’s comments were described as “deeply insulting” by Sinn Fein’s Aengus O Snodaigh, who speaks for the party on international affairs. Sinn Fein was the only major political party in Ireland to oppose the Lisbon Treaty.
“In the month since the Irish people voted overwhelmingly to reject the Lisbon Treaty, we have listened to a succession of EU leaders lining up to try and bully and coerce us into doing what they want,” O Snodaigh said.
“The fact is that the people have spoken and the Lisbon Treaty is dead.”
He added that Sinn Fein had sought a meeting with Sarkozy when he visits Ireland Monday.
“It is important that President Sarkozy understands that the Irish people demand that our vote is respected and, more importantly, our concerns addressed,” he said.
Even supporters of the Lisbon Treaty reacted badly to Sarkozy’s initiative.
Eamon Gilmore, leader of the opposition Labour Party which backed the treaty, told the Irish Independent that Sarkozy had apparently “seriously put his foot in it.”
Reminds me of the medicare bill insanity back in 2003: http://tinyurl.com/64k8hr
This is the same Sarkozy that won’t allow the French people a referendum in case they vote ‘Non’ again.
Recent polls say the French would vote “Non” again.
The Irish are being belittled as the the country of 3 million who voted no, with very little media acknowledgment that Ireland was the only country allowed to vote on the issue at all.
They’ll probably arrange a 2nd vote on the thing, just like they did on the Nice Treaty a few years back, when all the newspapers and media went into full blown pro-treaty mode to push a yes vote down people’s throats.
And it will be “passed” and Ireland will effectively cease to exist, becoming the “Irish region” of the new, highly militarised, EU SuperState.
And with the self altering nature of the “treaty” nobody need ever vote on anything again.
TOLD YOU SO!
They pulled the same stunt after we rejected the NICE Treaty a few years ago.
I haven’t been back to Ireland since 2002. If they force a second vote, I’m seriously thinking of flying back, just to vote NO.
Or should that be “Non”.
That’s a nifty campaign slogan:
“Vote NON”.
I’m sick of these crypto-fascists. First, fingerprinting Gypsies, then all Italians, now this.
Even less subtle than Bush, if that were possible.