The decision by the Fine Gael party leader, Mr John Bruton, to give his support to Mr Simon Coveney (26), son of the late Mr Hugh Coveney, and to him alone, has provoked a bitter dispute in the constituency of Cork South Central.
One Fine Gael member in the constituency who may oppose Mr Coveney for the nomination is Mr Sylvester Cotter, who has been in the party for 20 years. Yesterday he said it seemed to him and to other members of Fine Gael in Cork South Central that a "closed shop" was being operated in the constituency.
Mr Cotter said that a "dynasty culture" had developed in the constituency. The sitting Fine Gael TD, Ms Deirdre Clune, succeeded her father, Mr Peter Barry, who recruited the late Hugh Coveney into politics.
It appeared to him, he added, that people not involved in "the clique" had no chance of succeeding at the Fine Gael selection convention, and that Mr Bruton had pre-empted the democratic process of the convention.
At a news conference in Cork on Thursday, when he sat beside Mr Coveney, Mr Bruton was asked if he would be willing to do the same thing for other candidates who might put their names forward. He replied that he would not. At the same time, the party leader said it was open to anyone within Fine Gael's ranks to go forward and he insisted that the party's ethos was purely democratic.
Responding to Mr Cotter, Mr Coveney said that he would welcome others into the fray and that once the selection convention had made its decision, the party should then unite behind the nominated candidate.
He rejected any suggestion that a clique was operating in the constituency in which his father held the seat before his death during a walking accident last March.
"I would be a fool to reject John Bruton's offer of support, and of course I welcome it. "But I want to be my own man and I want to go before the electorate insisting that I have the right credentials with which to win this seat. "I don't deny that the family name means something in Cork South Central, but my father would have wanted me to go about this in my own way and that is what I intend to do," Mr Coveney said.