DUP Strangford MLA Jim Shannon has been selected to contest the seat vacated by disgraced MP Iris Robinson in the forthcoming Westminster election.
Mr Shannon was unanimously selected by the Strangford DUP Westminster Association on Wednesday night.
"I am honoured and humbled to have been chosen by my party colleagues to contest this important election", Jim Shannon said.
"I will be fighting a positive campaign based on hard work and strong, genuine and well-documented unionist beliefs."
Mr Shannon will be attempting to return a 13,000-plus majority secured by the DUP when Mrs Robinson retained her seat in 2005.
The wife of First Minister Peter Robinson resigned from her seat after revelations about her affair with a 19-year-old teenager.
Mr Shannon has served on Ards Borough Council since 1985 and has represented Strangford at Stormont since 1998.
"I have a very strong record of hard work and effort for my constituents that I can stand over in this election", he said.
"Whilst others may flit from one job to another before deciding that they fancy a run at Parliament, I have devoted the last 25 years of my life to working for the people of this great constituency both at a local government and Assembly level."
Former Victims' Commissioner and former UTV presenter Mike Nesbitt has already announced he will be fighting the election in Strangford under the Ulster Unionist/Conservative Party banner.
"For the last two years, I have been on the ground, not on TV", Mr Nesbitt said on Wednesday.
"And as an aside, being good on TV is no disadvantage when it comes to promoting Strangford in Parliament."
"I hope the fact Strangford has a tradition of returning a unionist MP will not be an excuse for unionism to rip itself apart."
On Tuesday, DUP MLAs voted in favour of the devolution of policing and justice powers from Westminster despite opposition from the UUP.
The following day, senior Ulster Unionists rebuked DUP calls to agree candidates in a bid to recapture key Westminster constituencies currently held by Sinn Fein and the SDLP.
© UTV News