Imagine going into a drapery shop to buy a suit of clothes and discovering that the jackets and trousers are all in separate boxes, making it impossible to tell which matched which.
And imagine further if the assistant, rather than opening up the boxes to enable you to make your best selection, refused to disclose the contents of the boxes but insisted that you would have to take your chances with whichever combination of jacket and pants you might end up with by random selection. This is what it will be like to be a voter in the forthcoming general election.
The sense one obtains from the media coverage of the recent preening and posturing of the various political parties with regard to whom they may or may not enter into partnership with after the election is that it is a matter of the parties holding out on one another. There is much talk of Labour's calculated snub to Fianna Fáil, Fianna Fáil's snub to Sinn Féin, and so forth.
In truth, the only snub is to the electorate, which is being told by all political parties: you must cast your vote without the slightest hint from us as to what kind of government you may be helping to bring about.
Having purchased your suit in a poke, you must get into your car, from which the mirrors have been removed and the windows frosted over, and drive home under the illusion that you have made a free and informed choice.
This withholding of vital information from the electorate is deeply undemocratic and right now seems likely to turn Election 2002 into a meaningless farce.
Afterwards, those who have been responsible will sit around criticising the electorate for its apathy and bemoaning the fact that the turnout will have once again broken new records of indifference.
Given that the chances of a single-party government are, as things stand this morning, somewhere between slim and nil, the most vital information required by the voter is which parties are likely to coalesce, with whom are they likely to do so, and which parties are not going to coalesce with anyone.
Without this information, party manifestoes are essentially meaningless, because any commitment entered into before the election can be reneged upon afterwards "in the interests of stable government".
All manifestoes are being drafted on the basis of an objective - single party government - which is unattainable other than in the dreams of Fianna Fáilers.
Moreover, recent political history tells us that the most important element in the negotiation of any coalition administration is the wish-list of the potential junior partner, with the larger parties likely to backtrack on each and every commitment made to the public if this improves their chances of getting their backsides in contact with the upholstery of power.
This in itself is undemocratic enough, but for it to occur in a situation where the mooted combination has not been canvassed before the electorate, or indeed may by hint, innuendo or implication have been ruled out, is sufficient to render farcical the entire electoral process.
The result is that the only choices open to the voters on this occasion will be between individual candidates on the ballot papers of the various constituencies.
There will be no possibility of voting tactically for or against any combination of parties, or indeed to make any informed or useful attempt to indicate a choice of government.
It is odd indeed that politicians who constantly bemoan the emphasis on the parish pump, and incessantly inform us that we must look beyond our local requirements and focus on the national stage, will have in effect given us no choice except to vote on a purely local basis.
Again, these same politicians will be the first to complain if voters take this logic to its obvious conclusion and cast their votes for independent candidates running on single issues of purely local significance.
Itis time for us to examine more closely the nature of the illusion we continue to insist on calling Irish democracy.
Over the past 13 years a situation has developed whereby the right of the electorate to decide on the formation of its government has been usurped by political parties seeking to bypass the inconvenient involvement of the electorate and form governments by stealth.
Doubtless, pedants will be moved to write in to remind me that the Dáil, in fact, elects the government. Yes, but the choices before the Dáil should be ones of which the electorate has been afforded due notice.
It is as though the electorate is nowadays regarded as an enemy of the wishes of politicians, and so must be kept in the dark and fed information on a strict need-to-know basis, the issue of the need-to-know being decided not by reference to the public interest but to ensure a maximisation of opportunities for politicians.
The obvious solution is a prohibition on all coalitions which have not been canvassed at an election. The trouble is that virtually all the relevant political parties have by now acquired a vested interest in the prevailing situation.
