The pantomime over who will be first or deputy first minister must end, Alliance Party leader Naomi Long has said.
She said it made "absolutely no sense" that the joint roles were being used in the Stormont election campaign to "terrorise people into voting for somebody to keep the other side out".
People are "wasting" their vote next week if they choose parties based on the constitutional question "when there are so many other pressing issues", she added.
Read more: Every candidate running for the Stormont Assembly
Launching her party's Assembly manifesto, Mrs Long said Irish Sea trade arrangements under Brexit's Northern Ireland Protocol have seldomly been raised on the doors during the campaign.
She said the concern around cost-of-living pressures and hospital waiting lists "far outweighs which route your sausages take from GB to Northern Ireland".
The DUP collapsed Stormont's power-sharing Executive in February in protest over Protocol-related trade barriers on goods shipped from Great Britain to Northern Ireland.
The party has warned they will not re-enter government until their concerns over the post-Brexit deal between the UK and EU are resolved.
The DUP and UUP have also refused to confirm they would nominate for the role of Deputy First Minister if Sinn Féin emerged from the election as the largest party and was entitled to nominate for First Minister.
Speaking in East Belfast, Mrs Long warned: "This is not just an election about who will be in government, but about whether or not we will have a government."
A home-heating grant for low-income households and a £20-a-week child payment scheme are among the Alliance manifesto policies aimed at addressing the cost-of-living crisis.
The party also pledges to fully implement the Bengoa review recommendations into Northern Ireland's health service, and calls for more integrated housing and education and a "green new deal" for the economy.
Mrs Long called for Stormont reforms so that MLAs no longer formally designate as nationalist, unionist or other.
She also said the titles of the first and deputy first minister should be changed.
"It is time that this pantomime around the first and deputy first minister office was brought to an end," she said.
"It is a co-equal office with co-equal partners in government. They cannot sign a piece of paper, they cannot change the photo on the wall, without having the permission of their counterpart.
"And so instead of having this stick with which to beat the population, this idea that we can terrorise people into voting for somebody to keep the other side out, when in fact, at the end of the day both will be recognised and respected in the office, makes absolutely no sense.
"And in this election it's being abused again through the politics of fear to try to stop people voting out of hope for what they actually want for Northern Ireland."
Mrs Long said that the election was not about the constitutional future of Northern Ireland.
"You're voting for people to make basic decisions about your standards, about the state of the health service and our other public services," she said.
"So from my perspective, wasting your vote on the constitutional issue in this election, when there are so many other pressing issues, really doesn't make any sense."
She said the public want parties to pay more than "lip service" to substantive social issues, adding: "It isn't good enough to wrap yourself in a flag."
Speaking at CIYMS leisure facility, Mrs Long said some unionist parties wanted to fight the election by raising fears over the Protocol but "circumstances have overtaken them".
She said: "The truth is for people to really care about something, they need to feel its impact, and people do not feel the impact of the Protocol in the way that some parties would wish us to believe."
"What people feel the impact of is rising fuel costs, rising food costs, not being able to heat their home and feed their families."
Mrs Long also said people were "feeling the pain" of healthcare waiting lists, adding: "That is a hugely pressing issue for people, and it far outweighs which route your sausages take from GB to Northern Ireland."
Read more: Every candidate running for the Stormont Assembly
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