NEXT Monday is an important date in the calendar of Irish politics, the 10th anniversary of the last time the Irish electorate was given a genuine say in the election of its government. The minority Fianna Fail government under Mr Charles Haughey, which was returned on that occasion, was the government which could, by any stretch of the imagination, be described as a government of the people, for the people, by the people.
None of the last three coalitions - Fianna Fail/Progressive Democrats, Fianna Fail/Labour or Fine Gael/Labour/Democratic Left - was canvassed before the electorate. Moreover, all of these were, when not specifically ruled out, presented as highly improbable outcomes during the relevant election campaigns.
First, the 1989 election, following which Fianna Fail went into coalition with the PDs. Even if we leave aside the bitter rivalry between those two parties before the election campaign, it is difficult to imagine that a single person went out in June 1989, with either the hope or the intention of voting in a coalition of Fianna Fail and the PDs.
Such an outcome had about the same degree of probability as the Rev Ian Paisley being made Pope. In fact, that campaign was fought between Fianna Fail and an alliance between the PDs and Fine Gael, which took the form of a formal pact from the early weeks of the campaign.
The campaign was also characterised by predictable and bitter exchanges between Fianna Fail and the PDs. Twelve days before polling day, Mr.. Desmond O'Malley was moved to attack Mr Haughey's "craving for absolute power" and to accuse the Fianna Fail leader of displaying favouritism towards certain (unspecified) corporations and wealthy individuals.
Mr Haughey, meanwhile, described the Fine Gael PD "Agreed Agenda for Action" as a "cynical exercise" and a "marriage of desperation".
Fianna Fail dropped three seats and the PDs eight. Immediately following the election, the Fine Gael leader, Mr Alan Dukes, proposed a coalition between Fianna Fail and Fine Gael. This was rejected by Mr Haughey as it would represent "a betrayal by us of the electorate who voted for Fianna Fail on our clearly stated policy of single party government".
Three weeks later, Mr Haughey hailed the coalition between Fianna Fail and the PDs as "a new departure in our political life".
THE much touted alliance of the 1992 campaign was the famous "rainbow coalition" between Fine Gael, Labour and the PDs. The idea was first mooted early in the campaign by Mr John Bruton, the leader of Fine Gael. He proposed a voting transfer arrangement between the three parties, though stopping short of a pre election pact.
Mr O'Malley, refusing to rule out an alliance which would include both Labour and the PDs, emphasised that the proposed alliance should be seen "not as a rainbow, with its connotations of varied and disparate parties, but a consensus government".
For much of the campaign, Labour had little or nothing to say on the subject and did not rule in or out any specific permutation of parties. But the idea that the election would result in a coalition between Fianna Fail and Labour was implausible from the start.
Both parties complained bitterly about one another during the campaign. Mr Dick Spring accused Fianna Fail of "dirty tricks and negative campaigning" and of spreading "dishonest smears" about his party. A fortnight before polling day, Mr Spring spoke about the "deep sense of betrayal" with regard to Fianna Fail, "even among its own supporters". The party, he said, had betrayed the unemployed, the poor and the sick too often.
Three days before polling, Mr Spring accused Fianna Fail of propagating a "series of lies" in an election broadcast. Within hours of the completion of the election count, Mr Spring was on radio saying that Labour, which had more than doubled its representation, would have "serious difficulties" with going into government with Fianna Fail.
"I did express my difficulties with that concept during the election campaign," the Labour leader said, "and nothing has changed in that respect."
Mr Spring succeeded in transcending such difficulties to the extent of within a few weeks, hammering out a coalition arrangement with Fianna Fail.
Two years later, as might have been anticipated from the tone of the campaign, that coalition bit the dust. It was replaced by the present rainbow coalition of Fine Gael, Labour and Democratic Left. This combination did not have the numbers to form an administration in the immediate aftermath of the 1992 election but the Dail arithmetic had altered to make this scenario possible.
However, in the course of the 1992 election campaign, such an option was explicitly ruled out from the beginning. Fine Gael and its leader were adamant that under no circumstances would they go into coalition with DL. Some Fine Gaelers fumed that they would not get involved in any "left wing alliance with Moscow".
This line held through the campaign. Following the poll, Fine Gael's Mr Jim O'Keeffe said that, on the basis of the ideological and practical difficulties involved, going into government with Labour and DL "would not be a proper course for us to follow".
A Fine Gael statement, a week after polling day, said that all concerned should understand that Fine Gael would not take part in "a centre left government as now being proposed by the left and the extreme left - particularly as no such proposal was put to the electorate by any party before they voted".
Labour and DL drafted a joint agreement with a view to initiating coalition talks, but a Fine Gael front bench statement said the PDs would have to be involved from the outset in any talks between Labour and Fine Gael. If Labour did not agree, the statement added, it should "immediately open discussions with Fianna Fail".
And so, a coalition between Labour and Fianna Fail, which had appeared next to impossible for the duration of the campaign, came into office at the start of 1993. Less than two years later, this was replaced by a coalition which had been ruled out in even more trenchant terms throughout the 1992 election.
For the third time in five years, the will of the people was betrayed, without as much as a cock crowing.
If you're thinking of writing in a short, pedantic letter to the editor asking if "John Waters is aware that the Dail elects the government?" the answer is: "Yes, I am." I know also that, in a PR system, forming governments on the basis of complex election results can be difficult. My point is that, given the lack of openness, transparency and basic honesty on the part of all the major parties, the last three governments were formed on a basis tantamount to deception.
Happy anniversary, fellow voters.