Shredded unionist vote casts shadow on Trimble's day of victory

IT WAS a fly in the victory champagne. The UUP had topped the overall poll, but Sinn Fein took a seat in the party leader's back yard.

Early yesterday afternoon David Trimble was talking up his chances. The Ulster Unionist Party was going to take three seats in the unionist heartland of Upper Bann. Unquestionably.

"All the indications we had last night were very encouraging," he said. "We'll see how the count progresses." Could the shredding of the unionist vote see the SDLP topping the poll? He laughed as if it was the funniest thing he'd heard all day.

His wife, Daphne, stood quietly as her husband's personal assistant came up and asked for sandwiches. "I think he expected me to go and buy them," she said. As Mr Trimble juggled TV interviews she was asked whether her husband would be staying until the declaration. "I asked him that a moment ago and I almost got an answer."

At the nearby counting centre for Newry & Armagh, Mr Trimble's colleague, UUP candidate Danny Kennedy, was less bullish about his personal chances of a seat. But back at the Upper Bann count in Banbridge, Mr Trimble positioned his shiny shoes behind his mark, ready for yet another camera. "The UUP will take its three seats here," he said, "as expected."

At 3.40 p.m. one of the count officials emerged. By now the rumours that Sinn Fein had secured a seat were circulating.

"Anyone got an abacus," he quipped.

Then word came that Mr Trimble had demanded a recount. One of the seats in his own constituency had gone to Sinn Fein. The recount confirmed the situation, giving Sinn Fein's Michelle O'Connor a margin of 90 votes. She was not in the centre, not having expected a win.

The figures were not lost on Mr Trimble. The UUP had come out as the top party, but the dreaded "shredded vote" had cast a cloud on his own parade. It was the system's fault, the voters' fault, but most of all Robert McCartney's fault. If only one third of Mr McCartney's voters had put an X beside the UUP.

"Oh, how those votes could have counted," he said. "It was only because of the totally unnecessary action of Mr McCartney. In forming the party and contesting this constituency he has deprived unionism of a seat and handed it to Sinn Fein."

With a parting stab at the media who predicted his downfall Mr Trimble left his constituency to talk to the wider voting public from a television studio in Belfast.