A Tangled Web

The Friday Essay





THE FROG CHORUS.



The decline and fall of the Ulster Unionist Party.





The legend goes as follows. If you throw a frog in boiling water it will quickly jump out. But if you put a frog in a pan of cold water and raise the temperature ever so slowly, the gradual warming will make the frog doze happily . . . in fact, the frog will eventually cook to death, without ever waking up. The Ulster Unionist Party increasingly resembles a frog.



Electoral meltdown has been looming for some time, but it has become more and more obvious since the Ulster Unionist Party signed up to the provisions of the Belfast Agreement. Reviewing the electoral battleground since 1997 must be troublesome for any thinking Ulster Unionist, assuming the term is not oxymoronic.



Despite the media hype and the international acclaim designed to protect David Trimble, the truth is that a fundamental schism opened up between the Party and it’s natural support base in 1997 and it has progressively widened ever since. The self-proclaimed “natural party of Government” has subsequently made all the classic mistakes of a Party in serious decline;



1. It found itself at odds with half of its own party membership. For seven years, the electorate has been treated to the unappealing vista of a Party publicly tearing itself apart. The leadership of the Party was either unable or unwilling to invest time and effort in convincing its activist members that the policy line being pursued was the right one for the Union. Anti-Agreement Unionists believe that this was because the UUP leadership was grossly incompetent in its negotiations with Government and Republicans and they found that too much was given away to voracious republicans. The RUC was sacrificed, the IRA killers strolled free, and the IRA got it’s proxies into Government, all-Ireland bodies were established and all for what? For a “cessation of military operations” that was falsely sold as peace when it patently was nothing of the sort.

2. It found itself detaching from mass grass-roots unionist opinion. Too much time spent in the company of the great and the good seemed to lull the Leadership into thinking that wishful thinking was a good substitute for keeping their traditional support base happy. The UUP was blessed with a remarkably loyal base of supporters, many of them in the older more affluent age group who looked to the UUP as the “respectable” voice of Unionism. But political cavorting with monsters such as Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness is far from respectable - and untold damage was inflicted at base level. This may be irreparable.

3. It found itself denying that anything was wrong. Each set of poor election results was presented as being minor blips on the road to success. The reality is they were markers en route to the slough of despond. By playing euphemistic games the UUP leadership seems to have convinced itself that all is still well. The problem is that no-one else is remotely convinced! This is what I refer to as Lotus-eater syndrome.



Whilst the UUP retreated into the bunker at Cunningham House, it’s main rival the Democratic Unionist Party advanced on every front.



It attracted in the young bright talent from Ulster Unionist ranks. The “baby lawyers” have all gone, absorbed into the DUP engine room.



It presented a united coherent front, which any political analyst knows is immediately attractive to the electorate.



It learnt how to smooth off uncouth edges. The DUP has morphed into the party that said YES to a style transformation that Susannah and Trinny would be proud of!



Sophisticated presentational skills, an effective Party organisation, a more accurate reflection of ordinary grass-roots opinion all adds up to a formidable alternative to the Ulster Unionist Party and each year that goes by widens the gulf between the two parties. But it is worse than this.



Once a political party gains the knack of winning it becomes a habit. The DUP is now in this enviable position. In contrast, the UUP has acquired the art of losing. The indications following the Euro-elections last week are deeply disturbing for Ulster Unionists facing into a General Election campaign next year. Three of the UUP existing five seats look vulnerable including that of the dear leader Mr. Trimble. It is possible that within a year the UUP will have seen its’ Westminster representation cut from nine seats in 1997 to two seats in 2005. Indeed a complete wipe-out is no longer impossible.



At that point the Ulster Unionist frog will have been boiled alive. A once mighty political force will have been brought to the point of extinction without even a croak of protest!