The UUP leader's "tidying up" of his party promises to be anything but tidy,writes Frank Millar, London Editor
David Trimble has chosen his "defining moment" and set a course which points to the long-predicted implosion of the Ulster Unionist Party.
Stung by yesterday's resignation of the party whip by MPs the Rev Martin Smyth, Mr Jeffrey Donaldson and Mr David Burnside, the embattled leader has opted for a final confrontation and a blood-letting.
Mr Trimble is particularly infuriated by Mr Smyth, the party president who presided over last week's meeting of the Ulster Unionist Council which gave Mr Trimble victory over Mr Donaldson by 54 per cent to 46 per cent.
Given the party constitution requiring officers to implement the decisions of the council, Mr Trimble regards the Rev Smyth's position as president - and Mr Donaldson's as vice-president - "wholly untenable".
He also made it clear last night that he considered Mr Donaldson and Mr Burnside no longer Ulster Unionist candidates for any Assembly election because they were selected on the basis of a commitment to accept the party discipline.
However Mr Trimble's determination goes beyond the presumption of his opponents to remain on the officer team or his list of Assembly candidates. In his statement the leader said he regarded the trio as effectively resigned from the party.
"Resignation would clearly be the principled course of action," he declared. "In any party elsewhere in the United Kingdom their action would be regarded as a resignation from the party. I can only assume that they recognise and intend this outcome but merely wish to place on the rest of the party the task of tidying up the situation."
With the fateful words "so be it", Mr Trimble then began the "tidying up" operation by which he intends the party officers to institute the disciplinary procedures for the removal of his tormentors. It will be anything but tidy. Moreover, having appealed to Mr Donaldson not to quit, Mr Trimble now risks the suspicion that he was disappointed when the Lagan Valley MP chose to stay and that it is he and his supporters who are inviting the party to a full and formal split.
This would be an extraordinary gamble for a leader of any party to take. But is Mr Trimble entitled to take it with "his" party? The UUP is riven by the most profound policy divisions, Mr Trimble leads it by an uncomfortably narrow margin, and nearly half of it - represented by Smyth, Donaldson and Burnside - together with the DUP, represent the majority of unionists in Northern Ireland.
Those urging Mr Trimble to do or die will harbour no doubts. For some time a number of the political class around Mr Trimble have been advocating a purging of the dissenters, seemingly convinced they can recreate the UUP in their own pluralist and inclusive image. Many outside the party will understand their frustration with the never-ending circuit of UUC showdowns which Mr Trimble wins against the odds only to find the dissidents back at his heels.
However, Mr Trimble, too, has been prepared to play fast and loose with the democratic imperative. In October 2001 an Assembly election should have followed his failure to secure a unionist majority for his return as first minister. Instead, Mr Trimble allowed members of the Alliance Party and the Women's Coalition to redesignate themselves unionist for the day, for the purpose of returning him to office. The two governments and the other pro-agreement parties knew this was a shoddy business, held their collective nose, and looked the other way.
Which brings us to a critical point: the Rev Smyth, Mr Donaldson and Mr Burnside can contend that there is a larger issue at stake here than even the internal democracy of the Ulster Unionist Party. For the point of the redesignation was that it violated the right of the majority of the unionist community in Northern Ireland, as enshrined in the Belfast Agreement.
Since that day Mr Trimble has been unionism's minority shareholder, battling to maintain an agreement to which a majority of unionists do not consent. That he has been faithful to the agreement is not in question. That he has been valiant in face of formidable opposition is indisputable. And had the project succeeded, had he secured a deal on IRA acts of completion which he could confidently commend to the unionist electorate, he might have hoped to claim vindication and preside over a deepening and still more credible peace process.
Instead, the power-sharing project has crash-landed, and Mr Blair was forced to cancel the election because there was - and is, at this time - no prospect of Mr Trimble winning the necessary unionist majority to ensure a return to devolved government.
In such circumstances it might have been reasonable for Trimble supporters to acknowledge that their conduct of negotiations with Sinn Féin had not been an unalloyed success, and that, because of the IRA's failure to deliver, it is Mr Donaldson's assessment of affairs, not their own, which chimes with many unionists.
Instead, they have perceived Mr Donaldson's failure to resign as their moment of strength and opportunity. However, even some of his supporters may think the final sundering of their party too high a price to pay for a Belfast Agreement Mr Trimble can no longer guarantee.