Irish Examiner view: Will Donaldson address DUP tribalism?

Early test for new leader of party.

Will new DUP leader Jeffrey Donaldson want, or be able, to rein in the extreme elements of his party?

It is not entirely clear if new DUP leader Jeffrey Donaldson wants to, or can, rein in the wilder elements of his party but events have presented him with an early test.

European Commission vice president Maros Sefcovic will be questioned by Stormont’s executive office committee today over post-Brexit arrangements that have angered unionists. Those arrangements were agreed to avert the reimposition of a hard border on this island.

In advance of that meeting, Mr Sefcovic has been told by DUP MLA Diane Dodds that his position “defies logic” and that he must “stop ignoring the views of unionists regarding the Northern Ireland Protocol”.

This kind of drum-beating leaves little enough wriggle room for Mr Donaldson. He can feed the tribal crocodile or he can consider the views that hold sway outside the bubble his more strident colleagues inhabit. It is early enough in his leadership to hope that he might wish to be part of a rational process — but to do that, he would have to defy his party’s never-never rump.