An election for the leadership of the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) was held on 8 April 2017 at the party's Annual General Meeting. Elections are held each year, with the incumbent usually reelected unopposed. The 2017 contested election was triggered after incumbent Leader
Mike Nesbitt
Michael Nesbitt, MLA (born 11 May 1957) is a British politician and former broadcasterelected in 2012, announced following the 2017 Assembly election his intention to step down as party leader. While initially, Robin Swann and
Steve Aiken
Stephen Ronald Aiken (born 16 June 1962) is a Northern Irish politician, who served as Leader of the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) from 2019 to 2021, and was Chief Whip of the UUP from 2017 to 2019.
Aiken has been a Member of the Northern Irela ...
were expected to run against each other (with candidacies by Doug Beattie, Robbie Butler and Roy Beggs Jr. also considered possible), in the end only Swann ran and was elected unopposed.
2017
File:2017 Events Collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: The War Against ISIS at the Battle of Mosul (2016-2017); aftermath of the Manchester Arena bombing; The Solar eclipse of August 21, 2017 ("Great American Eclipse"); North Korea tests a ser ...