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Sir Jeffrey Donaldson’s stunning downfall after being accused of “historic” sex crimes has thrown Northern Ireland’s largest pro-UK party into disarray ahead of the general election.
Donaldson, who resigned as DUP leader on Friday, said he would contest the charges. But that leaves Gavin Robinson, 39, interim leader of the Democratic Unionist Party, grappling with the task of holding together a shell-shocked party that was already bitterly divided over Brexit while fighting for his own survival as an MP.
“There is certainly the potential for internal chaos but. . . it is imperative that the party comes together because if it were to end in some sort of civil war, the electoral consequences would be great,” said Duncan Morrow, a politics lecturer at the University of Ulster.
The DUP long dominated Northern Irish politics until its defeat by pro-Irish Sinn Féin in the 2022 regional elections. The UK general election this year promises to be equally tough for the party, which has eight MPs .
“They were already worried about the potential of a split unionist vote,” said David McCann, an election analyst. “They will now have to change their entire campaign strategy to hold as much ground as possible ahead of the Westminster elections.”
Donaldson, who had led the DUP since 2021 following the resignation of Arlene Foster and a 21-day mandate from Edwin Poots, has spent the last two years doggedly pushing London to address his party’s concerns over Brexit.
This led him to withdraw the DUP from the power-sharing assembly and executive at Stormont in 2022, paralyzing local politics as he insisted Northern Ireland’s place as part of the United Kingdom was at stake.
After winning further concessions from the Westminster government, he ended the boycott in February and was at the height of his political power when he was charged.
Robinson, a tall, silver-haired lawyer who became vice-president only last year, played a significant role in Donaldson’s negotiating team in striking a “union safeguard” deal that secured Stormont’s return in February.
He is expected to face a major battle in his East Belfast constituency, where he has a slim majority, against Naomi Long, leader of the Alliance Party who held the seat from 2010 to 2015.
“[Robinson] he has the most vulnerable DUP seat to fight, so he may not even have a parliamentary seat in a few months,” said Jon Tonge, professor of politics at the University of Liverpool.
Another senior party figure, Emma Little-Pengelly, is also under pressure. She serves as deputy prime minister in the power-sharing executive at Stormont, having been drafted in by Donaldson despite her not being elected.
The manner of her appointment could leave her exposed if Donaldson’s post-Brexit trade deal with London – which loosened controls on goods entering the region from Britain and remaining there – collapses. The deal has already failed to convince party hardliners such as Sammy Wilson, who resigned as head of the presidency at Westminster.
“There is no doubt that the events of this week will galvanize anti-unionist parties who will see that we have been weakened by all of this,” Wilson told local broadcaster Cool FM on Saturday. “There are divisions even within trade unionism which will be difficult.”
Donaldson, who has represented Lagan Valley since 1997, has not said whether he will resign as an MP, but Ben Lowry, editor of the unionist newspaper News Letter, told BBC Radio Ulster that a by-election could be “really disastrous for the DUP”.
Donaldson’s resignation as party leader comes at a difficult time for unionism in Northern Ireland, where the DUP has had to swallow its pride and serve alongside a Sinn Féin prime minister.
Protestants and unionists are now minorities in a region divided from the rest of the island in 1921. Sinn Féin calls for a referendum on Irish unity within a decade.
A poll last month found the DUP was seven points behind Sinn Féin. Support for the smaller Ulster Unionist Party has collapsed, while the hardline Traditional Unionist Voice is a fringe group. Together, all three have about 40% support.
Donaldson’s humiliating exit was “another, further blow to unionism,” Tonge said. But “in the short term there is no chance of the DUP collapsing [Stormont] institutions”.
DUP support for a return to Stormont was 60%, according to a poll this month by the University of Liverpool, and Tonge said a Stormont collapse would be “too electorally risky”.
But TUV leader Jim Allister said Donaldson’s exit “has an impact on trade unionism as a whole. This must be a cathartic moment.”