Sinn Fein Wins Parliamentary Elections in Northern Ireland

The Irish nationalist party Sinn Fein won the largest number of seats in the Northern Ireland Assembly for the first time in its history, but a difficult negotiation for the formation of a government between unionists and republicans is expected.

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The former political arm of the Irish Republican Army (IRA) and advocate of Irish reunification, will be the first party in the regional Parliament after securing 27 of the 88 seats in dispute and will be able to claim the post of local Prime Minister.

The historic victory means Sinn Fein is entitled to the prime minister's post in Belfast for the first time since Northern Ireland was founded as a Protestant-majority state in 1921.

However, under the Good Friday Agreement (1998), Sinn Fein should head a power-sharing executive.

Northern Ireland Minister Brandon Lewis called on the second most voted party in Thursday's election, the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), to nominate a deputy chief ministerial candidate to get the Northern Irish government back on track.

The leader of the DUP, Jeffrey Donaldson, has insisted that his party will not enter the government until the Protocol for Northern Ireland between the European Union and the United Kingdom is eliminated.

Negotiations are nevertheless expected to be difficult, given that the Unionists refuse to join the cabinet as long as the customs controls between the island and the rest of the United Kingdom, established by the Brexit agreements, persist.

Unionists consider that these controls threaten the unity of the country, made up of four nations, three of which (England, Scotland, and Wales) are located on the island of Great Britain and the other on the island of Ireland.