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LAST UPDATE | 9 Jun 2024
WITH SEATS FILLING quickly in the capital, a depressing picture is emerging for Sinn Féin in party leader Mary Lou McDonald’s heartland where just two of seven council hopefuls are likely to be elected.
It’s a microcosm of the party’s problem in electoral areas across the country: too many Sinn Féin candidates vying for too small a share of the vote to get candidates across the line.
Sinn Fein has secured only 12% of first preference votes nationally with most first counts completed this evening, 10 points behind Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, while Independents and the smaller Opposition parties have reaped much of the benefit of any anti-government vote McDonald might have hoped would be hers for the taking.
In the north inner city, only incumbent councillor Janice Boylan has been successful in a ward which comprises about half of McDonald’s Dublin Central Dáil constituency and where it ran three candidates.
In the adjoining Cabra-Glasnevin ward, also part of McDonald’s home turf, Séamus McGrattan, a Sinn Féin councillor for the past 15 years, is trailing in eighth place as of the 13th count tonight, in a seven-seater ward where his party ran four candidates.
Transfers from his three running mates are likely to see McGrattan scrape the last seat here ahead of Labour councillor Declan Meenagh.
An overambitious roster of candidates may have squandered a chance to bring in two candidates here, with the party’s non-McGrattan vote fairly evenly split between two of his running mates, Drumcondra-based Calum Atkinson and Cabra-based Amy Farrell, who runs Mary Lou McDonald’s constituency office, with about 930 votes apiece.
The party parachuted Natalie Treacy, a councillor for Castleknock on neighbouring Fingal County Council, into the Cabra-Glasnevin ward too, but she polled poorly and was eliminated early in the count.
McDonald topped the poll in Dublin Central in 2020 with almost two full quotas – raising quite a few questions as to why she hadn’t brought a running mate home with her, amid a nationwide failure by the party to turn its strong vote into the a corresponding number of Dáil seats. Trying to not make the same mistake this time has obviously backfired, especially amid a decline in the party’s popularity over recent months borne out by several opinion polls.
Fine Gael has taken the biggest share of first preference votes in both Dublin Central wards, after only scraping the sixth seat in the north inner city in 2019: it’s a strong result for the party
The government party looks set to bring in two candidates in the adjoining Cabra-Glasnevin electoral area. Minister for Expenditure Paschal Donohoe, also a TD for the constituency, was only delighted, as he told our reporter.
Accompanied by a delighted @Paschald, Fine Gael Councillor @RayMcAdam has been RE-ELECTED in North Inner City@thejournal_ie pic.twitter.com/hHUkP7sh4j
— Lauren Boland (@laurenanna_1) June 9, 2024
Left-wing Independent councillor Cieran Perry, a veteran of the bin and water charges protest movements, was the first candidate returned in Cabra-Glasnevin this afternoon, followed by Green Party first-time candidate Feljin Jose, a campaigner on public transport and active travel with the Dublin Commuter Coalition who received the highest first preference vote of any of the individual candidates here.
The more cautious approach taken by Fine Gael and the Green Party – running fewer candidates to ensure their vote is not split in these large and diverse wards – has paid off and contrasts strongly with Sinn Féin’s struggles.
Interpreting her party’s poor showing when she spoke to the media this afternoon, McDonald noted that anti-government votes had been picked up by Independents and others.
In her own consituency, along with poll-topping Perry, Independent seats have been picked up by veteran councillor Christy Burke (a former Sinn Féin member) and fourth-time councillor Nial Ring.
When The Journal walked around the north inner city recently with Burke and other candidates, it was clear that immigration was an issue on the doorsteps for some voters: not all, but enough to secure election for anti-immigration Independent candidate Malachy Steenson earlier today.
Steenson had the fifth highest vote share in the seven-seat north inner city when he was elected on the 12th count, albeit just short of a full quota. His election to Dublin City Council, along with that of Gavin Pepper in Ballymun-Finglas, marks a breakthrough for Ireland’s far right, which has long failed to make electoral gains.
When Mary Lou McDonald arrived at the RDS earlier today, she was warmly, even affectionately, welcomed by the party’s members and supporters.
As she did a circle of the count centre, she was met every few metres by a candidate or canvasser with a few words for her – usually tinged with some disappointment, but the feeling was more one of party members seeking solidarity with their leader rather than one of putting the blame on her.
The message McDonald brought was that Sinn Féin would “learn and listen” before the next election.
With reporting by Lauren Boland in the RDS count centre.
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Formerly the most stable state in the Middle-East. Hundreds of thousands dead and fundamental islamists set to capitalize on it. All because they decided to talk about pricing oil in Euro instead of the US dollar.
Truly terrifying what you can do with public opinion and a large military budget.
They’ve had a horrible last 50 years. First Saddam, now this. Terrible.
Re R H Beige Lark.
Well said. Libya was invaded for the same reason. It was going to take oil payments in anything, commodities, gold, euro etc. The threat to the Petrodollar was too much. I’m afraid Iran will go the same way unless they start taking payments in dollars again for their oil.
The US is a country teetering on the brink financially and the last thing they want is any upstart threatening to stop using Petrodollars. I believe the US government knows it is close to the abyss and hence the Sandy Hook massacre and Boston bombing events which have been orchestrated and planned to take more rights away from citizens, especially attempt to get high powered weapons away from people with subsequent pre planned legislation.
Libya actually had an excellent way of ending debt in African countries, they were about to introduce an African gold standard that countries would have to use to pay for African commodities
Couple of weeks later Libya is no more and the other African leaders are put back in their place
Gaddafi actually had some very bright ideas to make the middle east a very financially stable region, unfortunately it involve a threat to the petroldollar. If Libya and the others involve put their plan into action it would have put the dollar into a early grave by showing it’s true overwashed value. But hey they showed us that Libya, afgan and Iraq were evil countries that were a threat to mankind. We found the true hero’s in the middleeast like Saudi Arabia were it’s traditional to stone a woman to for wearing a dress that exposes flesh.
Sandy hook was orchestrated?! What a despicable comment!
You mean the same Iraq that gassed their own civilians? Or the same Libya which was trying to establish a modern empire of its own by invading and trying to annex Mali?
Rose-tinted glasses work both ways.
Seoirse, you are reaching a low with your comments. You are reading from the same script as b Lowe.
Niall, so if a African country receives gold for commodities what happens then? Please elaborate? There is a reason why the gold standard was dropped. Not every country has reserves of gold so how would they trade with Africa?
Must make a correction, I was referring to Libyan expansionism in Chad, not any involvement in Mali.
Re Niall.
You are exactly right with the gold dinar system Gaddafi was close to implementing.
The French President st the time, President Sarkozy, called it the greatest threat on history to the financial existence of mankind(wherein mankind for Sarkozy was France and a handful of other Western countries).
Imagine a system that was one of the greatest threats to mankind as described by an imperialist and it received zero coverage in Western media outlets.
Ah yes, the great legacy of the US/UK unprovoked illegal invasion and the papers still play the pipers tune.
A recent survey on the UK found the majority of people think fewer than 10,000 have died in Iraq since the invasion. Good to see Western media is giving an unbiased and objective accounting of Iraq over the years.
How can George Bush look in the mirror with all the murders and killings he has caused. He should be strung up and locked away for life and charged with war crimes!!! It breaks my heart every time I read about this :(
Sunni and Shia Muslims where killing each other centuries before anybody ever heard of George Bush or even America for that matter.
Re Al Shamen.
Yes, your point is valid but it is an inconsequential one.
The point is as a result of US stupidity this has been allowed to fester and there is an abundance of weapons available for these guys mow since General Petraeus started to arm these guys.
Iraq has always been awash with weapons.Apparently most households have access to an AK47.
Most of the weapons Al Qaeda use are Eastern Bloc.America has a lot to answer for but you cannot blame them for a centuries old sectarian feud that predates the foundation of that country.
Al Shamen – The US is awash with weapons too. Apparently most households have access to something that shoots bullets and they want to keep it that way. People get killed there in their droves on a daily basis and their human rights record is frankly appalling. There has also been civil war, sectarian strife and effective apartheid in the US within the last century. It has also engaged in criminal foreign wars. Again it is an irrelvancy to what has been said here.
Nobody has blamed the US for there having been age-old sectarianism in Iraq – though the CIAs involvement in keeping various factions at war is legendary – but people are right to expect the US to answer for its actions in recent times and to expect some sort of defence of those actions without it pulling in excuses like “there was always trouble so we can be excused of what we did to them”.
Well it was America who formed and funded the Al Queda to help them against the Russians, so America does have alot to answer for.
Democracy, don’t ya just love it! They do!
Every dog on the street knows the invasion was based on utter lies and a direct consequence of those lies is one and half million people dead……..spreading democracy ?? spreading death and destruction !!
Freedom!
Well Mr jingles freedom is what we have but when I look around all I see is people trapped in financial pain, there is a big problem with the system
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