Now that all the excitement about the Nobel Prize for Physics has died down I thought I would do a quick post to follow up my previous one about the election for the next President of Ireland (Uachtarán na hÉireann). Only three people gathered enough support by the deadline to be named on the ballot paper, namely: Catherine Connolly (an independent TD standing as a unified leftist who has the support of Sinn Féin, Labour, the Social Democrats and People Before Profit); Jim Gavin a former GAA player and football manager for Dublin, Civil Aviation Authority bigwig, and flying instructor in the Air Corps who was picked up by Fianna Fáil as their candidate; and Fine Gael candidate Heather Humphreys.
Sunday 5th October saw the withdrawal of Jim Gavin. It has to be said that he looked and sounded completely out of his depth in the TV debates, performing so badly that the bookies had put him at 16-1 by Sunday morning, but the final straw was a scandal over rent overpaid by a tenant to Gavin 16 years ago and never returned. I thought Gavin always looked like a potential banana skin for Fianna Fáil leader and Taoiseach Micheál Martin but in the event he turned into a hot potato that left Martin with egg on his face. In retrospect it seems a very serious error of judgement to back such a weak candidate.
Apparently Martin had pushed FF members very hard to select Gavin as their candidate, even though he wasn’t a member until recently, but now they are wondering why they had been asked to endorse a dodgy landlord from outside the party when there were so many of those already in it.
So now there are only two candidates, except that the relevant electoral law does not allow a candidate to withdraw after the deadline for nominations (which was 24th September) so Jim Gavin’s name will still be on the ballot paper. It will be interesting to see how many people vote for him despite his withdrawal, as a kind of protest. They might make a difference, as might those who transfer their first choice to Heather Humphreys. I suspect many ardent FF-ers will just not vote, though. In that case it will simply be down to who wins the most first preferences.
It wasn’t – and still isn’t – obvious to me which of the two remaining candidates is favoured by these shenanigans, but it is clear what the Bookies think: odds are currently Connnolly 1/3 favourite and Humphreys 11/4. At the start of the campaign Catherine Connolly was the outsider, but she’s now odds-on favourite. She’s the only candidate whose team has canvassed me (so far)
Election Day is Friday October 24th.
And as if all that excitement weren’t enough, today was Budget Day. The reaction to that might well influence the vote for President: if it is unpopular, the anti-establishment vote might increase.
Update: it is clear from here that Gavin’s votes will be treated as valid and if he finishes third on first preferences, his transfers will be counted in the usual way.
In the Dark 