Maze Stadium Proposal:Stormont minister Edwin Poots is facing D-Day over his commitment to a 35,000-seater sports stadium, the chairman of his Assembly scrutiny committee claimed today.
As the Democratic Unionist minister prepared to face the Culture Arts and Leisure Committee at Stormont, he was warned by Sinn Fein's Barry McElduff MLAs were looking to him to clearly state meeting his position on the proposed £55 million arena on the site of the former Maze prison.
Mr McElduff said: "The purpose of today's meeting is to get to
the bottom of a whole lot of things.
There is speculation that the DUP has got at the minister
over the whole question of a multi-sports stadium.
"I cannot say whether that is accurate but there are many, many questions that need answers.
"Today is effectively D-Day for the multi-sports stadium debate because as a statutory committee scrutinising a Government department we will be asking pertinent questions and we are looking at a number of substantive reports that have shaped the debate to date on the feasibility or otherwise of the Belfast options, the Maze/Long Kesh site and how that came to be in the first place.
"There's a question over whether Edwin Poots is going to act decisively as a minister.
"Hitherto Edwin has described himself as a minister who will not shirk the difficult decisions and we will see further evidence today of whether he can live up to that."
Fresh doubts have emerged in recent weeks about whether Mr Poots will be able to sanction a sports stadium for international soccer, rugby and GAA matches at the Maze prison site.
Some unionists have been unnerved by Sinn Fein claims that the project must also include a conflict transformation centre at the Maze, retaining one of the infamous H-Blocks which housed loyalist and republican prisoners and the prison hospital where 10 IRA and INLA hunger strikers died in 1981.
The minister has been warned by cabinet and party colleague the Enterprise Minister Nigel Dodds that unionists will not stomach any stadium project linked to anything which glorifies terrorism.
East Antrim MP Sammy Wilson and fellow DUP Assembly members Nelson McCausland and Jim Shannon have also been critical of the project, siding with Northern Ireland football supporters who claim it would make more sense to locate a new soccer stadium in the heart of Belfast rather than a 365-acre site outside the city.
The Maze project also envisages an agricultural showground, an indoor arena, houses and cafes on the site.
Mr McElduff said he did not get the impression at this time the dream of a Maze stadium was becoming a lost cause.
"What I am looking for is an assurance from the minister and other DUP ministers that they subscribe to the notion of a shared future," the West Tyrone MLA said.
"The multi-sports stadium will be shared between sporting bodies such as the Gaelic Athletic Association, the IFA (Irish Football Association) and rugby.
"The notion of a shared stadium is central to the notion of a shared future.
"We have had a number of commitments from the DUP and Sinn Fein previously that we are all buying into this. So it is around now that we need to be hearing from the DUP that the concept of a shared future will be central to its decision making about a multi-sports stadium."