'I wouldn't like to win an extra seat on the back of this tragedy." The words of Galway West colleague and Marine Minister Mr Frank Fahey last week when he was asked about Fianna Fáil's chances in the wake of junior minister Bobby Molloy's resignation and Mr Molloy's announcement that he would not stand in the election.
Fianna Fáil is now tipped to win a third seat in the five-seater constituency - the seat it lost to the PDs when Mr Molloy defected to that party in 1986. However, Progressive Democrats councillors who met in the Menlo Park Hotel in Galway last Wednesday, some hours after Mr Molloy's announcement, were in determined mood.
They issued a statement expressing sympathy with the victim in the Naughton rape case, and expressing appreciation for the role that Mr Molloy had played in national and local politics over 37 years.
Mr Declan McDonnell, the PDs' former national party chairman, former treasurer and former mayor of Galway, is expected to seek the party's nomination to run in Galway West.
He began canvassing with Mr Molloy as a 16-year-old and is one of at least four PD councillors in Galway city and county who may seek to stand. Mr Molloy made it clear that none of his family would seek the nomination.
In the 1999 local elections an effective vote management strategy ensured success for the PDs, with four seats on the city council. Mr McDonnell believes the Dáil seat can only be held with another strategic approach. "We won't win this with one candidate, but with three of us we can sweep up the Molloy votes in the various parts of the city and county," he said.
One councillor who had already declared his hand is Galway mayor Mr Donal Lyons, who says he is convinced it is " a winnable seat". The mayor also confirmed that Mr Molloy had been reluctant to run again but had "come under pressure from head office".
County councillor Noel Grealish is also considering his options, while city councillor Terry O'Flaherty may also stand. Ms O'Flaherty is the daughter of another former mayor, Bridie O'Flaherty, who is described locally as "the mother of the PDs". Ms O'Flaherty was said to be "devastated" at Mr Molloy's resignation, while her daughter has described the former junior minister as "the father of modern Galway" in a letter to the Connacht Tribune.
The reaction in the city last week was one of shock but general agreement that the junior minister had "done the right thing". Even after the correspondence on the case was revealed, most messages read out on Galway Bay FM were supportive.
Mr Molloy had taken a keen interest in water safety, and spoke to this newspaper last year about his involvement in it - influenced largely by his near-drowning as a boy. He was instrumental in the establishment of professional offices for the voluntary Irish Water Safety Association, on Galway's Long Walk near the Claddagh basin.
Only Galway taxi-drivers who are still annoyed about deregulation expressed a different view. Apart from the taxi issue, however, Mr Molloy's personal popularity rating had remained high until the recent Galway Advertiser /Bluebird Marketing poll which showed that he was in danger of losing his seat. The poll was taken before the selection convention when he declared he would run again.
During last week's furore, Mr Molloy was keen to put his own departure in perspective. "I would just hope that my bit of a crisis in this thing doesn't increase in any way the hurt to the victim.That would be my only concern."