The Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, has denied that he influenced the outcome of the vote which resulted in the shock nomination of Prof Mary McAleese as Fianna Fail's presidential candidate. He was speaking at a press conference attended by Prof McAleese and the defeated candidates, former Taoiseach, Mr Albert Reynolds, and the former EU Commissioner, Mr Michael O'Kennedy. The Taoiseach expressed "some surprise" at the support for Prof McAleese.
"It is hard to determine these matters. I could not have called it in the last few days nor did I seek to go out and try to influence it in the last number of weeks.
"Any one of the candidates who went before the party would have been an excellent candidate on behalf of Fianna Fail in this contest," he said.
As it happened, the parliamentary party "by a strong vote" had supported Prof McAleese and they would all unite to fight the election for the highest office in the land, he said.
"There were three very successful campaigns operating within Fianna Fail over the last number of days and people have very different views on that matter. There was also a fourth group, which was operating not on behalf of the other three, but saying we should add a fourth candidate from somewhere else," he said.
A lot of the new and young parliamentary party members had expressed their views quite strongly. Prof McAleese said she "brought a dream to Fianna Fail, of a vision that I have for the Presidency for the next seven years". She had told Fianna Fail that she also believed it was "their vision" and was now convinced they agreed with her.
Undaunted by the possibility of following in Mrs Mary Robinson's footsteps to Aras an Uachtarain, Prof McAleese expressed "tremendous admiration" of what the former president had accomplished. There were as many differences between herself and Mrs Robinson as there were similarities and "it would do her absolutely no service" to compare them.
"But I certainly hope that at the end of seven years, people will look back with tremendous fondness on what I have brought (to the Presidency). If they look back on me with the same degree of fondness, I will feel very, very satisfied indeed," she said.
Expressing happiness to "carry the banner" for Fianna Fail in the forthcoming election, Prof McAleese said she had been away from party politics for 10 years and was not a member of the party. However, Fianna Fail was her "natural homeland".
Her life had taken her down many paths and she sensed a mood that people wanted a President who could speak to them "from above the world of politics and beyond the world of politics" and who could truly symbolise Ireland and all they hoped for the country.
Adding that she was touched by the "the grace and serenity" demonstrated by Mr Reynolds and Mr O'Kennedy, she said the former Taoiseach "very often gave me hope to awaken in the morning and face a day of hope".
As President, she would, "every minute of every day", use the role as a mechanism for bringing people to each other. At the end of that Presidency, she hoped we could say that Ireland is "truly a changed place". Her vision for the Presidency would be one of reconciliation. The next Presidency would straddle the second and third millenniums in an Ireland that was now very complex. Very few symbols reconciled people all the time and the Presidency was one of them.