THE Irish Republican Socialist Party (IRSP) has been barred from contesting the upcoming Assembly election as its constitution did "not meet legal requirements".
Founded in 1974, the party was due to contest the Assembly elections for the first time in its history with one candidate announced in West Belfast and one in Foyle.
The IRSP – which is the de facto political wing of the Irish National Liberation Army (INLA) – said it submitted an application to register as a party with the Electoral Commission in January this year, but that this was rejected last Tuesday (March 22). It accused the Commission of attempting to "deny the IRSP access to the democratic process".
In a statement to the Andersonstown News, the Electoral Commission said the IRSP's constitution "did not meet legal requirements".
The IRSP said it had "corrected the oversight and forwarded the required documents with a clear explanation".
"On Friday (25th March) having apparently processed this new information the Electoral Commission informed the party leadership that it would be nearly impossible to process this in time for the IRSP to run in the assembly elections in May as the new documents would require the party to submit an entirely new application, a clear and deliberate manoeuvre to push us past the required deadlines to put forward a party candidate.
"The IRSP view this as a clear cut attempt to deny the IRSP access to the democratic process and deny us the availability to pursue our objectives exclusively through peaceful and political means and in turn an attempt to democratically gag any voice that stands up to the establishment.
"We are calling on the Electoral Commission to immediately begin to proactively work with us to resolve this impasse."
The Electoral Commission said: "Applications to register a political party are subject to detailed assessment against the criteria set out in law. If an application fails to meet those tests, then we must refuse it.
"The proposed constitution submitted by Irish Republican Socialist Party did not meet the legal requirements so therefore the application had to be refused. The party has now resubmitted its application and provided a new constitution for consideration. We will assess it accordingly and take a decision on all aspects of the party’s application in line with the legal requirements.
"We try to process registration applications as soon as possible after they are received. However, the Commission must carefully assess applications against the criteria set out in the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000. Undertaking this process can take some time in order to ensure the Commission reaches a fair conclusion within the legislative requirements."
The IRSP's West Belfast candidate, Dan Murphy, said his party "we will be fighting their (Electoral Commission) decision with everything we have got".
"If that fails, I will be standing for election regardless," he said.
The impasse could mean that Mr Murphy will be forced to run as an independent.
