Billy Leonard is not your average Sinn Fein candidate. A former RUC reservist, he served as an SDLP councillor before defecting to Gerry Adams’ party, writes Garbhan Downey.

His decision to leave the four-strong SDLP grouping in Coleraine council to become its first ever Sinn Fein representative led to Leonard being ostracised by the bulk of his council colleagues.

“There are some councillors who don’t speak to me now,” he says. “There’s this idea that you’re nearly respectable and acceptable if you’re an SDLP person, but become a Sinn Fein member and the tap is turned off in terms of communications.”

Originally from Lurgan, Leonard now lives in the well-appointed seaside town of Portstewart. His neighbours in this religiously mixed area are more civil than his fellow politicians. On a door-to-door canvass on Thursday night, nobody turned him away, and several offered support for him.

Young people too are frank about why they like him. “The SDLP are in decline,” remarks one first-time voter. “They’re not innovative, whereas I think Sinn Fein are.”

A university student reckons Leonard’s past life is proof of an open mind. “I don’t mind that he was in the RUC. That’s what he was born into. But it shouldn’t stop him becoming an Irish republican.”

The 50-year old candidate is a relaxed canvasser as he walks around Portstewart’s Victorian streets with his wife Valerie, who is standing in the council elections. He has been targeted in the past, however. On one occasion a device was left outside Leonard’s house, prompting a sympathy visit from Gregory Campbell. But it’s a visit that the DUP man, now a rival candidate, is unlikely to repeat.

“At the time, Leonard was in the SDLP,” recalls Campbell. “But then he signed up with Sinn Fein — and all their attendant baggage of terror, intimidation and bank robberies — and he crossed the line. I’m afraid the normal niceties no longer apply to him.”

Campbell holds no truck with the idealism that took Leonard from being a Protestant RUC man to the door of Irish republicanism. He comments: “He’s an ex- policeman, an alleged ex-Orangeman, an ex-SDLP man — there are an awful lot of ‘exes’ before his name. He won’t have anywhere near as many Xs come election day.”

Both Leonard and Campbell are convinced that their respective parties will increase their council representation in East Londonderry on May 5. Sinn Fein currently holds one seat in Coleraine (Leonard’s) and four in Limavady, and it hopes to raise that tally to two and seven respectively. The DUP hopes to pick up another two seats in Coleraine, bringing its total up to nine, and would like to double its quota in Limavady from two to four.

John Dallat, of the SDLP, refuses to comment on Leonard’s decision to run for Westminster. Dallat outpolled Sinn Fein’s Francie Brolly by 2,000 votes in the battle for nationalist supremacy four years ago. But Sinn Fein wound up 500 votes ahead in the assembly elections in 2003.

“The tide is now turning back,” insists the SDLP man. “Some of our supporters gave their votes to Sinn Fein to encourage the peace settlement. But they realise that this was a fundamental mistake. They know that for the process to be strong, the SDLP has to be strong.”

David McClarty of the UUP will not be drawn on Leonard’s candidacy.“It’s a free country,” he says. “Neither he nor Dallat are going to win anyway. It’s a two-horse race between myself and Campbell.”

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