Donaldson cock-a-hoop after huge vote

Lagan Valley: Quietly sipping a cup of tea in the count centre's canteen, Jeffrey Donaldson made a few quick calculations in…

Lagan Valley: Quietly sipping a cup of tea in the count centre's canteen, Jeffrey Donaldson made a few quick calculations in his head, sat back in his seat and smiled.

It was still early in the day and the turnout had just been announced. But the signs from the newly-opened ballot boxes in Lagan Valley were overwhelmingly positive.

The 40-year-old dissident Ulster Unionist MP, who had the largest personal vote in the whole of Northern Ireland yesterday, knows he could well play the role of kingmaker when it comes to restoring the power-sharing government. Not only that, but he is already planning to use his powerful position, bolstered by the addition of several anti-agreement unionist colleagues, to shake up the party when the election is over.

"People want a better agreement. This agreement hasn't worked. We'll have to go back to the drawing board.

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"Yes, there will have to be changes within the Ulster Unionists after the election, otherwise we're going to be in very serious trouble come the next general election," he said.

To David Trimble, Lagan Valley represents all that is wrong with unionism.

It is a hostile cauldron where bitter infighting threatens to tear the party apart.

In the constituency, where 13 candidates are competing for six assembly seats, Mr Donaldson is joined by two other Ulster Unionist rebel candidates, Ms Norah Beare and Mr Jim Kirkpatrick, one of whom may get elected on the coat tails of his 8,000 transfers when counting resumes later today.

The Ulster Unionists's sole pro-Trimble candidate in Lagan Valley, the mayor of Lisburn, Mr Billy Bell, is expected to get elected when the count continues later today.

So deep are local divisions that the Trimble loyalist and chief whip for the Ulster Unionists, Mr Ivan Davis, was edged out of the selection convention and stood as an Independent. He performed poorly and was last night on course for an early elimination.

The DUP also polled well yesterday and all indications are that it will increase its representation from one to two seats.

Former DUP assemblyman Mr Edwin Poots was elected on the second count last night, while Mr Andrew Hunter, MP for Basingstoke and a former Conservative, is expected to be elected on transfers later today.

The Alliance Party's Mr Seamus Close, who topped the poll in the 1998 Assembly election, took the third highest share of first preferences and is expected to be elected to take his seat on cross-party transfers today.

This leaves a fierce three-way battle for the sixth seat between the SDLP's outgoing seat-holder Ms Patricia Lewsley, Sinn Féin's first-timer Mr Paul Butler, and the Ulster Unionist's Ms Norah Beare, all of who are within a few hundred votes of each other.

"I'm quietly optimistic," said Ms Lewsley last night. "It will come down to the transfers and maybe that's where we can pull the rabbit out of the hat."