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Donaldson defects to DUP

February 16, 2011

By Staff Reporter

Taking two other Assembly members with him, Donaldson said he was considering whether to join the Rev. Ian Paisley’s Democratic Unionist Party, which has already invited him onto its negotiating team.
It’s thought Donaldson, along the other two dissident Assembly members, will join the DUP in the New Year, boosting their strength at Stormont to 33 members, compared to the UUP’s 24.
Donaldson said it was “a sad day” for him because he had joined the UUP as a teenager, but he had “come to the conclusion that it is not the party I joined and it has abandoned the principles I believe in.”
A terse statement from the UUP said Donaldson’s ” decision is a matter of regret, but it has not come as a surprise. His recent actions and comments culminated at last Friday’s executive meeting where he stated that he no longer trusted the party.
“Jeffrey was a modernizer in the talks team right up to the last minute. Thereafter he lost his way. We wanted him to remain in the party, supporting its policies and democratic decisions. He clearly felt unable to do so.”
Senior UUP figures are still sounding out internal party views to decide if they should advise Trimble to stand down. Among them are John Taylor, Jim Nicholson and Reg Empey. All have solidly supported Trimble so far.
The Donaldson resignation marks the end of a damaging five-year internal political battle over support for the 1998 Good Friday agreement. Donaldson walked out of the talks leading up to the accord in the hours before the UUP signed up.
Since then, he’s waged a continual battle against Trimble and the agreement from within the party. Trimble resisted expelling him until last summer, but that attempt ended in failure when the High Court ruled the party’s rules had not been followed.
Trimble has persistently said the only difference between him and Donaldson over the agreement had been a “tactical” one, but the two sides have clashed at repeated Ulster Unionist Council meetings, with Trimble beating him each time.
Some believe the row was personality driven, with Donaldson eager to take over as leader. Others say Trimble cunningly used his differences with Donaldson to extract further concessions from the British government.
During the November Assembly election campaign, Donaldson published a mini-manifesto and humiliated his party leader by appearing on a set-piece live radio talk show to contradict Trimble when he said the UUP was united behind his leadership.
Trimble-loyalists blame Donaldson for the UUP’s poor showing in the elections, relative to the DUP, and moved against him two weeks ago at a meeting of the party’s executive committee.
Donaldson was given until Jan. 6 to agree to abide by party policy, resign or face disciplinary proceedings. He decided to pre-empt any moves against him, saying he didn’t want to give the party the “satisfaction” of expelling him.
The Donaldson resignation, along with those of fellow Assembly members Arlene Foster (Fermanagh/South Tyrone) and Norah Beare (Lagan Valley), could lead to a realignment within unionism, with at least one leading UUP moderate predicting the collapse of the party within a year.
Donaldson said resignation had been the only honorable course for him, because he had been faced with an ultimatum to support party policy handed down by the UUP executive committee.
He said he wanted change, and added: “Could I secure that change by continuing what has become a very acrimonious debate within the UUP which could only get more divisive if there are moves to expel me?”
Two of the Ulster Unionist’s remaining five MPs, David Burnside and the Rev Martin Smyth, are also opposed to the Trimble line on the Agreement. Burnside differs with Donaldson over tactics, saying it had been a mistake to leave.
Smyth, currently the UUP’s president, is also demanding Trimble’s resignation either now or at the party’s annual general meeting in March, when the leadership is automatically up for debate.
“There is no other leader in a democratic party who would have stayed on given the scale of opposition against him,” Smyth said. “He should stand down in March at the annual general meeting”.
Paisley, the DUP leader, welcomed Donaldson’s decision.
“The three Assembly members recognized that their mandate to work for a new and better agreement for Northern Ireland cannot be achieved from within the confines of the UUP,” he said.

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