Jeffrey Bolts the Party

TO no one’s surprise, Jeffrey Donaldson bolted the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) in order to line up behind the Rev. Ian Paisley in the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP).

It is a strange destination for a man once heralded as the architect of a rebirth of moderate Unionist politics in Northern Ireland. Donaldson for long was considered to be a prime figure on the liberal wing of the UUP and was widely viewed as such in the U.S. before his strange transformation.

Indeed, Donaldson was regularly put forward by the British government in America as the accommodating face of Ulster unionism and was a frequent visitor to these shores on that type of mission. There was no reason, then, to believe that he would be anything but a reformer when his day came.

Indeed, Donaldson told a leading Irish American that he was distraught when David Trimble, considered a very hardliner back then, took over the role of party chief in 1995. Donaldson fretted at the time that right wingers had taken over his party and made a political compromise impossible.

Fast forward a few years and Donaldson himself has become that hardliner, joining ranks with Paisley, the scourge of moderate politics in Northern Ireland for over a generation.

The sight of Donaldson being warmly embraced by Paisley certainly could never have been predicted a few years back. The two men seemed destined to head the opposing factions of unionism, but now Donaldson is definitely under the big man’s thumb.

When Donaldson backed out of supporting the Good Friday Agreement on the day that it was signed in 1998 he effectively signed his own political death warrant. He has spent the last half decade relentlessly pursuing Trimble for that act; yet, when the time came to openly challenge him with a direct leadership contest he always pulled his punches at the last minute.

For a skilled politician who has a remarkably high personal vote, Donaldson was an obvious leader in waiting if he had moderated his criticism of Trimble and expressed it in private as is done in any other political party.

Instead there were a series of grandstanding events designed to topple and humiliate Trimble publicly. On every occasion Trimble outmaneuvered his pretender and showed him up as a politician who went weak at the knees when the real challenge began.

Donaldson’s final hope was to emerge from the recent election holding the balance of power in Ulster unionism, but he was unable even to achieve that. When Paisley narrowly won on the Unionist side Donaldson’s useful career with the UUP was over.

Now that he is in the Paisley camp Donaldson will have to rewrite much of his script. Unlike Trimble, Paisley brooks no rivals and has seen off many contenders for his crown over the past 30 years or so.

Certainly, the days when Donaldson could openly criticize his party leader with impunity are over. There are also several leading members of Paisley’s party who will view him as an interloper and do their best to impede his progress within the DUP.

So the strange story of Jeffrey Donaldson, once considered the bright light of Ulster unionism, continues to unfold. He is now destined at best for a bit part in the most right wing party in Northern Ireland. It must give him nightmares to consider just how far he has fallen from grace. 

A career that once seemed likely to create a major chapter in Northern Ireland’s political life will now merely become an incidental footnote. Politics do indeed make strange bedfellows.