Seamus Anthony Close OBE (12 August 1947 – 7 May 2019)[1] was a Northern Irish politician who was deputy leader of the Alliance Party from 1998 to 2001, and a Member of the Legislative Assembly (MLA) for Lagan Valley from 1998 to 2007.
The following year under the redistribution and expansion of Northern Ireland's constituencies his local political base became part of the new Lagan Valley constituency which he has contested in the Alliance interest in all elections since 1983 apart from the 1986 by-election called in protest against the Anglo-Irish Agreement when the local Alliance branch declined to contest the seat as they believed the by-election was a political stunt.
In the 1996 elections for the Northern Ireland Forum, Close stood at the head of the Alliance's list for Lagan Valley but the party failed to secure enough votes to win one of the local seats.
This ran against Alliance policy, which had been strongly supportive of the introduction of civil partnership laws, and he was publicly criticised by other senior party members.
[2] In November 2006, Close announced that he was retiring from politics[2] In the 2007 election he was succeeded as Alliance Party Lagan Valley Assembly representative by the then Mayor of Lisburn, Councillor Trevor Lunn.