Unionists constantly warn about the so-called pan nationalist front, but can there ever be real republican unity on Irish unity, asks John Coulter. You can follow John on Twitter @JohnAHCoulter.

 Have you heard the old joke about the formation of a new republican party; the first item on the agenda is the split!

While there has been much talk since the outbreak of the Troubles half a century ago about the need for unionist unity, there seems to be a lack of enthusiasm for its counterpart – republican unity.

Talk of unionist unity seems to revolve around calls for the need for a single unionist party to represent all shades of pro-Union thinking. But this is not being replicated in the nationalist community with calls for a single republican party.

The closest republicans have come to such an idea is the so-called pan nationalist front – a supposed mutual agreement between the Dublin government, the SDLP and Sinn Féin.

Certainly, in the past we have witnessed election pacts in unionism. For example, in the February 1974 Westminster General Election, the then United Ulster Unionist Council (known as the Unionist Coalition or UUUC) won 11 of the 12 House of Commons seats in Northern Ireland.

The UUUC represented three parties – the Ulster Unionists, Democratic Unionists, and Vanguard Unionists. Only Gerry Fitt of the SDLP managed to hold onto his West Belfast seat.

Earlier this year, in the European parliamentary elections Northern Ireland witnessed the emergence of a Remain coalition which took two of NI’s three MEP seats. How will republicanism respond if, like the Leave constituency in Northern Ireland, unionism becomes the minority ideology in the country?

Which tactic would best achieve firstly a border poll in post-Brexit Northern Ireland, but more importantly for nationalism, a result in favour of Irish unity? Would it be best for republicans to form a Nationalist Coalition similar to the UUUC, or merge to reform a single republican party known as The Nationalist Party?

In some past elections, such as West Tyrone, Fermanagh and South Tyrone, and Newry and Armagh, unionist candidates won or held these seats because of an evenly split nationalist vote between the SDLP and Sinn Féin.

But with republicans under the Sinn Féin banner becoming the majority electoral voice within the nationalist community, has talk of election pacts or a pan nationalist front been thrown in the dustbin? After all, if Sinn Féin is clearly the largest party, then does it not stand to polling reason that all nationalists should rally to the Sinn Féin cause?

There can be no doubting that Sinn Féin has eaten into traditional middle-class Catholic SDLP whilst at the same time retaining their support base in working class republican heartlands.

Long gone is the perception that to become a successful Sinn Féin candidate one needed to have served an apprenticeship in ‘the struggle’ – the ‘armalite and ballot box’ strategy has largely been replaced by the ‘honours degree and the ballot box’.

But even the modern generation of republican candidates with no first-hand connections to the conflict must pay some form of lip service to republican dead in terms of commemorations and memorials. Could this be a step too far for any remaining middle or upper class Catholic still loyal to the SDLP from switching that vote to Sinn Féin?

Sinn Féin has always been able to electorally taunt its opponents by boasting of its all-Ireland organisation, while the SDLP, the old Stormont Nationalist Party, and the now defunct Irish Independence Party were purely Northern based.

The SDLP has attempted to counter this image with a working relationship with Fianna Fáil in the Republic, while others in the party have favoured a working relationship with Fine Gael or Irish Labour. But could the solution really be a formal merger between Sinn Féin and the SDLP in a post-Brexit Ireland?

This SDLP/SF merger was an issue which I addressed nine years ago during my time as Northern Political Columnist with the Irish Daily Star.

It is interesting to note that the one nationalist visionary who saw the need for a single nationalist party, Declan O’Loan, a former North Antrim SDLP MLA, got his political knuckles severely rapped for suggesting such a move.

The SDLP and Sinn Féin may have different ideas as to what a united Ireland would consist of, but both parties need to recognise that, tactically, whilst they remain as separate movements talk of a united Ireland will always remain an aspiration rather than an achievable end goal.

Just as the SDLP, Sinn Féin and the Alliance Party approach May’s European elections from a pro-Remain stance, so too must pro-Irish unity parties and political active individuals merge to form The Nationalist Party with a clear cut agenda on how a united Ireland will firstly be achieved, and secondly maintained.

This would not be without risk for Sinn Féin – in entering such a ‘Nationalist Party’ project, it would have to be careful not to drive its hard-line working-class roots into the arms of dissident republican parties.

Likewise, in the SDLP, it must be careful that a proposed merger with Sinn Féin does not drive moderate Irish unity-inclined supporters into the hands of the Alliance Party.