(Belfast) Nationalist Sinn Fein came out on top in local elections in Northern Ireland on Saturday, winning the most seats at stake among the British province’s 11 city councils.
The Republicans of Sinn Fein, in favor of reunification with the neighboring Republic of Ireland, came out ahead in the ballot, ahead of the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), an ultra-conservative formation fiercely attached to belonging to the United Kingdom.
In detail, Sinn Fein won 143 of the 462 seats in 11 municipal councils. Only the results of six seats have not yet been released.
Sinn Fein leader Michelle O’Neill called the results “historic”, and told the BBC that her party’s campaign had “resonated with the electorate”.
She also said that Sinn Fein would “redouble its efforts to restore executive power”, blocked for a year by the unionists of the DUP.
Opposed to the trade rules imposed after Brexit, which he says threaten the province’s links with the rest of the United Kingdom, the DUP has been boycotting local institutions, supposedly shared with the Republicans of Sinn Fein, for more than a year.
The leader of the Unionist party, Jeffrey Donaldson, however, defended the results of the DUP, which obtained 122 seats, considering that it had “resisted” well.
Mr Donaldson meanwhile attributed Sinn Fein’s success to the “collapse” of its pro-Ireland nationalist rival, the Democratic Social and Labor Party (SDLP).