Latecomers to presidential race hovering with intent

WITH LESS than three weeks to go before the close of nominations, it had seemed as if the scene around the starting blocks for the presidential election was getting a little less crowded. We know now that Fianna Fáil is out of the race and many of the celebrity candidates who looked like they were limbering up have moved off.

About a week ago it appeared that the line-up might settle down to just four: Labour’s Michael D Higgins, Fine Gael’s Gay Mitchell and Independents Seán Gallagher and Mary Davis. That’s why these were the only names that Red C put in its most recent poll for Paddy Power, the results of which were published on Thursday.

However, just when we thought things were quietening down, no fewer than four more potential runners have been spotted hovering in the vicinity with differing degrees of intent.

We should get some clarity about Sinn Féin intentions after its ardfheis this weekend in Belfast. Speculation now centres on the Fermanagh-South Tyrone MLA Michelle Gildernew. She is well known in Northern Ireland as a former agriculture minister, but she will need to be introduced to most voters in the Republic. As an able politician, an effective communicator and a young mother, she will have appeal. She is likely if she runs to secure a vote share higher than the 10 per cent that the party got in last February’s Dáil election, but her entry would be unlikely to change the outcome.

This week we also heard that Dana Rosemary Scallon began contacting Fianna Fáil and Independent Oireachtas members. She has form in this contest having won a county council nomination in 1997 and 14 per cent of the popular vote. In 2004 Dana also flirted with the notion of contesting only to withdraw, claiming, peculiarly, that she had not been given sufficient time to canvass TDs, Senators or councillors. This time she has left it even later to begin initial approaches, which suggests she is unlikely, even if she is serious about it, to get a nomination.

This week also, Justin Kilcullen of Trócaire quietly began a worthy but apparently doomed effort to get Independent Oireachtas support for a nomination.

Potentially the most significant development came later in the week with news of a possible re-entry into the race by David Norris. Since his abrupt withdrawal from the contest in early August, Norris has been on holiday, but there has been a persistent effort, largely internet-based, to persuade him back in. These have been shored up by a series of Sunday Independentsurveys suggesting a public clamour for his return. On Thursday, Norris broke a four-week silence to tell his followers on Twitter that he was "looking forward to returning home this weekend and appearing on the Late Late Showon 16th September". At about the same time, Norris supporters (but not from his former campaign team) began to make exploratory inquiries of some Independent TDs and Senators about whether they might now be prepared to declare their support for his nomination again.

Norris made a mistake in early August by rushing out of the race before the popular response to the Ezra Yitzhak Nawi controversy could be properly assessed. He was also isolated by the resignations of key campaign personnel who felt betrayed because he had not informed them of the matter. All of which makes a re-entry at this stage very difficult for him. Even if he were to get a nomination, Norris would still have to persuade the public of his bona fides on that original controversy and that he has learnt from the mistake made in handling it.

A Norris re-entry would certainly be another dramatic twist but it seems more likely than not that we will end up with just five names on the ballot paper: Davis, Gallagher, Gildernew (or some other Sinn Féin candidate), Higgins and Mitchell.

If that is the case then Higgins, on 36 per cent in this week’s poll, is best placed to win the Áras. Comparisons between the support garnered by candidates this month and in last month’s Red C polls are not appropriate because Gay Byrne, Dana Rosemary Scallon, and Brian Crowley were included in the August poll.

Fine Gael argues that it is early stages in this race and that previous contests have seen dramatic movements once the campaigns proper have begun. Gay Mitchell himself reminded colleagues in Galway that Adi Roche was leading the field in polls at the start of the 1997 contest. He instanced an IMS/Sunday Independent poll on September 21st, 1997, that showed Roche at 38 per cent, ahead of Mary McAleese at 35 per cent, and beating McAleese 51 per cent to 49 when the transfers were distributed. Six weeks later Roche got 7 per cent in the actual election.

Fine Gael has a point. It is too early to assume anything, especially when we don’t even know what the final line-up of candidates will be. The difficulty for Mitchell, however, is that at a point when Fine Gael itself is polling almost 40 per cent generally, this presidential election poll shows him at only 24 per cent, a full 12 per cent behind Michael D Higgins and uncomfortably close to Seán Gallagher and Mary Davis on 21 per cent and 19 per cent respectively.

It will take one hell of a surge on Mitchell’s part, a collapse in Higgins’s support and a stalling or fall in support for both Gallagher and Davis for Mitchell to get ahead of Higgins. When the now powerful Fine Gael nationwide machine kicks into gear behind Mitchell, he may manage such a surge. However, even if he does get ahead, it is difficult to see Mitchell beating Higgins in transfers from Gallagher or Davis, assuming they are eliminated.

Higgins is also certain to significantly outpoll Mitchell in transfers from any Sinn Féin candidate.