Yet another sex scandal in British politics. This time to be involved is Sir Jeffrey Donaldson, forced today to resign as leader of the DUP, the main unionist party in Northern Ireland, after being indicted by the local police for complaints of "historic" harassment or abuse, the details of which are not available. currently specified, dating back to a few years ago. The politician was arrested and questioned yesterday - with a 57-year-old woman charged with aiding and abetting - before being released pending trial. Today the forced resignation took place.
Donaldson, 61, is a veteran of Northern Irish and UK politics and has been a member of the British Parliament at Westminster since 1997. In June 2016 he was awarded a royal knighthood with the title 'sir' by Queen Elizabeth, on the proposal of then Prime
Minister David Cameron.
"The President of the party - we read in a note released today by the Dup - has received a letter from Sir Jeffrey Donaldson MP in which he confirms that he has been indicted in relation to complaints of a historical nature and communicates his resignation as Leader of the Democratic Unionist Party (position he held since June 2021, ed.) with immediate effect". "In accordance with the party statute - continues the note - the
internal bodies have decreed the suspension of Mr. Donaldson pending the conclusions of the judicial proceedings".
The DUP unanimously appointed another of its Westminster MPs, 39-year-old Gavin Robinson, former mayor of Belfast and deputy leader of the party from 2023, as interim leader.
The scandal risks destroying the electoral prospects of the DUP, already declining in support in recent years, in the next upcoming Northern Irish local elections; as well as triggering new fibrillations within the local government of Belfast, reconstituted after two years of stalemate a couple of months ago thanks to the recomposition mediated by the central executive of London of the alliance between the largest Catholic republican party, Sinn Fein, which has become the first time relative majority strength in Ulster in the last elections, and the main Protestant unionist formation: an alliance foreseen in fact as obligatory by the historic Good Friday peace agreements of 1998, which put an end to the bloody season
of the Troubles, and led today by an all-female tandem made up of first minister Michelle O'Neill (Sinn Fein), and her deputy with equal powers Emma Little-Pengelly (Dup).
A recomposition for which the pragmatic role compared to the radical standards of other unionist exponents was decisive, guaranteed by Donaldson himself: a figure considered today as a mediator, despite having joined the DUP in the early 2000s from initially extremist positions, in opposition to the Friday agreements Santo and after leaving the more moderate Protestant formation of the UUP, then led by the 'dove' David Trimble.
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