Local knowledge and timeless issues help new faces make an impression

ON THE CANVASS  with IDOWU OLAFIMIHAN, ADEOLA OGUNSINA  and IGNATIUS OKAFOR:HE MOVES languidly along the driveway, a stack of flyers in hand, wearing a slightly rumpled grey suit and a broad smile. "Hello, madam. My name is Idowu. I'm here to remind you about the local elections on June 5th and ask for your Number One vote."

The African woman takes the Fianna Fáil leaflet and scans it for a moment. “Unfortunately, I’m for Fine Gael,” she murmurs apologetically. In his soft-spoken way he tries for one of her later preferences, but seems fairly unperturbed when she fails to commit. “I’m pretty sure the husband will vote for me,” he says as the team retreats across the lawn, chatting amongst themselves in Yoruba.

Across the road, the canvassers are greeted by an elderly man wearing long robes and an endless white beard. “I voted you! I voted you!” he exclaims at a high pitch. “You voted for me?” the candidate asks. “I will vote for you,” interprets Jerry, the campaign manager, in a whisper. “I tried to convince him a few weeks ago,” says Idowu Olafimihan contentedly. “He has his mind made up now.”

Elsewhere, a Portuguese-speaker is called in to translate at a Brazilian house, while an exchange with three Polish men staggers awkwardly to a close when neither side can understand what the other is saying.

Welcome to Mulhuddart, north Dublin, one of the most cosmopolitan parts of the country and a local election battleground where three of the 12 candidates are originally from Nigeria. As well as Olafimihan, Fianna Fáil’s representative, Adeola Ogunsina is standing for Fine Gael and Ignatius ‘Iggy’ Okafor – a former Fianna Fáil member who left the party “just before the recession” – is running as an Independent.

A large part of the ward consists of a constellation of sprawling, sparklingly new housing estates where, as recently as five years ago, there was nothing but fields. Population centres such as Ongar village and Tyrrelstown Plaza have the inescapable feel of Potemkin settlements that arose overnight – and, in a sense, they did.

Olafimihan has lived in nearby Clonee since 2000 and runs a local security company. He got involved with Fianna Fáil at the last local election, he says, having been drawn to the party because it was practically-minded rather than hung up on ideology. He also liked its stance on social integration.

On Thursday evening, in a new estate not far from Ongar, all but three doors on Olafimihan’s tick-list were opened by an immigrant, and it soon became apparent that, owing to anger over the state of the economy, the campaign team were not counting on a big vote among the native Irish electorate. Though Olafimihan insists he would represent the whole of Mulhuddart, he admits that personal ties within immigrant groups will carry a lot of weight. He points to a house with a taxi parked outside. “That is one of my taxi canvassers . . . If they pick up any passenger from around here, they try to persuade them. They say, ‘please, he’s a nice lad’, that kind of thing.”

The following night, Fine Gael’s Adeola Ogunsina arrives for the evening canvass in a jeep decorated with his own name, two Dublin flags and a prominent Barack Obama sticker on the back window. In contrast to the previous night, this estate is one of the oldest, most resolutely middle-class Irish estates in the area. Nearly every household has two cars and as many young children.

Ogunsina expects to have visited a quarter of the 17,000 houses in the ward by election day, and this is his second time on this patch. There are local whispers of some resentment towards immigrants here, as long-settled home-owners move out and let their homes to new arrivals. But tonight, the reception is mostly warm and unfailingly polite.

Dressed in a sharp tie and a sleeveless jumper, Ogunsina tailors his message to each voter, fluently reciting his ideas on a community creche, improved transport links and the need for more of a “business approach” in politics (Ogunsina ran three petrol stations in the locality).

An encounter with a man in his late 30s is typical of the non-committal goodwill he encounters. “Fianna Fáil won’t be getting the vote anyway,” he says, a computer game controller in his hand. “It’s Labour or Fine Gael, but the fact that you’ve come by will stand to you.”

“Oh, thank you. I wish I could give you a hug,” Ogunsina replies enthusiastically. The man smiles nervously. When a neighbour informs him he can “count on my Number One”, it visibly puts a spring in his step. “It’s getting a positive response like that that pushes you on to the next house.”

The one discordant note comes from a woman in her 30s, who opens to door in her pyjamas and immediately harangues a canvasser about how immigrants “get everything” and how she is “disillusioned with everyone”. Ogunsina is at another door and misses the exchange. “If I had a child, I wouldn’t get anything. We get nothing and they get everything – not just the Nigerians, all of them . . . If I had a baby, I’d have to pay for it.”

Over the evening, the Fine Gael candidate pushes three points: his party, his business background and his being local. Do people ever raise his background? “Today, no one has said it. That’s one of the reasons you start with your own introduction – so you can carry something that people would relate to,” he remarks. “Not that I don’t want to go into that . . . What I want to project first is a capability to do the job, my sincerity in going for the office and the fact that I’m very much interested in community issues.”

It’s almost 10pm on Friday, and a few miles away, Ignatius ‘Iggy’ Okafor and friends are celebrating the launch of Tyrrelstown GAA club, where he is a founding committee member. A former Fianna Fáiler, he left last year and has been campaigning as an Independent for the past nine months. In a former life Okafor was a professional soccer player with Antwerp in Belgium and Linz in Austria, before injury ended his playing career prematurely, and now he works as an IT engineer at Temple Street Children’s Hospital. He has also been a busy community activist here.

In an area where both are patchy, Okafor speaks passionately about the need for better transport connections and amenities for young people. “You’re trying to bring the kids up, give them the opportunity to be someone in the future. That’s how we start, giving them a proper school, facilities where they can play,” he says, sitting outside the Thirsty Bull pub as the warm evening turns into night.

While he insists he expects to win a seat, Okafor believes his run will have been a worthwhile experience, whatever the result. Above all, he feels gratified to have been encouraged and received so well. “I’m very, very happy. My campaign has proved a lot to me about what I thought about Irish people in the first place.”

He finds inspiration from other independents such as Finian McGrath and the late Tony Gregory – “people who stood up for the people”. And he’s also driven by the conviction that seeing an African face on every lamppost in the area will be important in convincing local children that “they can be more”.

“It’s quite tiring, and it’s hard work, but I’d prefer to do a little more hard work and see my daughter and my son do less work in the future.”