THERE'S still a hint of incredulity in Bríd Rodgers' voice when she speaks of the achievement of Good Friday 1998. There were plenty of seasoned politicians at Castle Buildings that day but few had been active for as long as the SDLP founding member and negotiator. She'd been involved in the civil rights movement since the mid-1960s and watched community relations deteriorate against the background of a 30-year conflict.
"[We] had to sit down and find a way forward at a time when relationships had been completely poisoned," she says, recalling previous failed talks processes.
"So it was a negotiation that you would think could go nowhere but the good thing about it is that it was inclusive – all the people who were involved, from Sinn Féin to the loyalist paramilitaries, the unionists, ourselves... we were all involved."
The former Stormont agriculture minister, now aged 88 and residing in Howth, Co Dublin, also cites the "benefit of the international input", including US President Bill Clinton, EU representatives and negotiations chair Senator George Mitchell – "a man with the patience of a saint".
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"You felt that you could never succeed because there was always the opposition to power-sharing; there was the opposition to having anything to do with people who are involved in violence – we went to South Africa and the unionists wouldn't even sit in the same room with Sinn Féin," she says.
"So that was the background that we were in and I believe that having come to an agreement with all of those things in the background was a huge achievement that people probably now don't recognise."
However, she concedes that there was nothing inevitable about securing a deal, and recalls the "jitters" on Good Friday morning until a decisive intervention by President Clinton, who spoke to all the party leaders.
"I thought it's the same old same old just going to unravel at the end because all of the other attempts had failed, and every time we thought we were near agreement the thing fell through, and it's going to be the same again," she says.
"I was very despondent because it was clear that David Trimble was under huge pressure, and he has never got the recognition for what he did, because in spite of the pressures within his own party which we never had, the pressures from without from the DUP and from the community that he was representing, he jumped, he took the risk. I think that was a brave thing to do, and was never recognised at the time."
Mrs Rodgers believes the agreement delivered on its most basic goal – to bring peace: "We've had peace now, more or less with some exceptions which are rare, for 25 years, and that's due to the Good Friday Agreement."
She then cites how George Mitchell stressed that the signing of the deal was where the real work began.
"I believe that the Ulster Unionists under the SDLP, who were then the largest parties, were working the agreement in spite of the difficulties," she says.
Tony Blair speaks to The Irish News to mark 25 years since the Good Friday Agreement
"And most of the difficulties were caused by the failure to decommission on behalf of the republican movement because the unionist community were absolutely intent on having no guns, no guns on the table or under the table."
She recalls that in those early days there was a "common interest" of the kind that saw Ulster Unionist Reg Empey going to Dublin to secure a cross-border gas pipeline, while Mrs Rodgers herself was building relationships with the "largely unionist" farming community.
"Even in the assembly, I had no-one politicking, I had no-one pulling me down or contradicting me – everybody was working together," she says.
"John Hume's idea was that when we work the common ground together, we will begin the healing process, and he was right – I saw that actually beginning.
"I could see it beginning but it was being stymied by the decommissioning issue, which wasn't happening, and eventually, of course, that's what brought the whole thing down around us."
The changes made at St Andrews to the mechanism for electing the first and deputy first ministers "immediately created a tribal situation", she says.
"And for 15 years, it was a case of 'we'll look after our side, and you look after your side' but nothing was really for the common good.
Gerry Adams speaks to The Irish News to mark 25 years since the Good Friday Agreement
"I don't believe that the DUP ever believed or ever could bring their constituency, their heartland constituency, to support real power sharing and partnership."
The former Upper Bann MLA recalls Nelson Mandela's advice to the parties – "it's not what you can get from your opponent that's the most important thing, it's what you can give your opponent that helps them to come to an agreement and vice versa".
"But that wasn't there, even though it was explained to us very clearly by Mandela, and I think that that's what bedeviled the process in the beginning," she says.
"The unionist community lost faith in it; they were disillusioned, and what they did then was they moved over to the hardline, and that that was the beginning of a sense of not working the basic principles and the basic ideas, and what was actually built into the agreement."
At the same time as the process diverged from the original template, support for the Ulster Unionists and the SDLP began to wane, yet Mrs Rodgers has no regrets.
"I think it was worth it because it stopped the killing," she says. "And for those of us who lived through all that killing over 30 years, three decades – as John Hume said, 'nothing is worth a life'."
She believes many people cast their votes more readily for Sinn Féin to ensure the peace prevailed: "It was clear from the ground up that people were saying 'Oh well, we have to support them because otherwise, the hawks will take over'.
"I think Sinn Féin played a very smart game in convincing the nationalist people that 'oh the SDLP are okay there's no need to to worry about them but we need your support', and I think that was worked very well."
Mrs Rodgers also argues that her party's main nationalist rival was "putting forward the SDLP view" at the time.
"They very cleverly took over our mantle, took over our views, took over everything we'd ever said that they opposed."
She says there was always a suspicion that bringing Sinn Féin in from the cold would cost the SDLP electorally but that it was a price worth paying: "But I still think I wouldn't have changed any of it because the violence was going to go on, it was going nowhere – the British weren't going to win, the IRA weren't going to win, but we're going to keep going regardless."
Reg Empey speaks to The Irish News to mark 25 years since the Good Friday Agreement
