It will be a year tomorrow since Brian Lenihan died at the young age of 52 of pancreatic cancer.

THE accidental president.

MICHEÁL MARTIN has admitted the Fianna Fáil hierarchy didn’t listen to its county councillors and must do so in future to rebuild the party.

DEAR Enda,

FOREIGN Affairs Minister Micheál Martin will tomorrow vote to oust Taoiseach Brian Cowen because he believes the “very survival” of Fianna Fáil is at stake.

THE Greens have been contaminated by their association with Fianna Fáil and their efforts to bring Fine Gael and Labour into a similar type of contact is not surprising, considering how badly the Greens are doing in opinion polls.

THE furore over the Taoiseach’s radio interview should make us very grateful that the Green party is in government with Fianna Fáil.

DID you happen to see the Heineken Cup final (albeit on Sky)? There was a defining moment in the second half.

SOME months ago members of the Scottish parliament visited Limerick to have a look at the huge regeneration plan for four of the city’s rundown estates.

AS WE settle into 2010, the Government assures us “the worst is over” and we have “turned the corner”.

OUT here in the real economy, the worldly-wise knew in mid-2007 that the Celtic Tiger was dead. Property prices started to fall, spending slowed, job losses accelerated and business sentiment turned sour.

IN a beautiful place called Tagaytay, just south of Manila in the Philippines, Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos built a magnificent, if ostentatious, hideaway known locally as the Palace in the Sky. It is built on a hill overlooking the famous Lake Taal with its multiple islands, volcanoes and lush green surrounds.

FINE Gael has for the first time become the largest party on Cork City Council, ending decades of Fianna Fáil dominance.

THIS is one constituency where there will definitely be changes of personnel.

BY far, Kanturk is the most difficult Cork County Council electoral area to call now that it has been reduced from a five-seater to a four-seater due to boundary changes.

WITH more than 20 years experience of campaigning on rural issues, noted community activist Brigid O’Connor is determined to break the FF-FG stranglehold on council seats in the Dingle area.

FF’s results in previous Euro elections are poor. From 1979 to 2004 the average FF Euro vote over the 30-year period was 34.73%. Over the same period, the FF vote in general elections from 1981 to 2007 shows a significant differential. Their average over nine general elections was 43.05%

THE expected defection of a prominent Fianna Fáil councillor to Fine Gael has prompted colleagues to accuse her of betrayal.

THERE is no alternative: It’s FF or the IMF. Deal with it.

FORMER European commissioner Padraig Flynn insisted at the Mahon Tribunal yesterday the IR£50,000 he received from developer Tom Gilmartin was given as a personal political donation.

FIANNA FÁIL was last night challenged to allow its TDs to vote with their conscience in a “free vote” on the motion of no confidence in Health Minister Mary Harney.

FINE GAEL will double the number of chairmanships it holds on Dáil committees under a deal brokered with the Government.

DEVOUT liberal Ivana Bacik and stanch conservative Ronan Mullen were last night poised to go head to head when the Seanad count resumes.

THE talks between negotiating teams from Fianna Fáil and the Green Party have concentrated on policy areas only and will not turn to the actual composition of the government until the end of the process.

READING Fergus Finlay’s column (May 29), there are some points I wish to raise in relation to the Labour party and its election performance.

McDowell talked emotively about his love of country, which he had demonstrated by his involvement in politics at considerable cost to himself.

THE Green Party was back in with a chance of getting into government last night after Fianna Fáil-initiated coalition talks began.

DISCUSSIONS between Fianna Fáil and its potential partners in government will not begin in earnest until later this week, although soundings were taken from independents yesterday, the Irish Examiner understands.

Outgoing PD deputy Liz O'Donnell has been eliminated in Dublin South where Seamus Brennan and Tom Kitt have both been returned for FF.

A SWING to or from a particular party in 16 bellwether constituencies will tell us a lot about the national trends, and could determine the overall shape of the 30th Dáil.

ENDA KENNY was still running yesterday, but it was the voters he wanted scared.

THE fishing community has traditionally been a powerful lobby group, but after a series of setbacks many do not feel they have the energy for a fight.

The results of The Evening Echo newspaper’s Red C poll for the Cork North Central constituency released today have shown a fall of 10% for Fianna Fail from 41% to 31%.

THREE Fianna Fáil candidates in the so-called “constituency of death” will find themselves under even more pressure as a post office lobby group plans to urge people to vote against them.

SEAN DOHERTY’s wife had a major role in his decision to drop the bombshell that Charles Haughey was fully aware that journalists’ telephones were tapped in the early 1980s, former government minister Máire Geoghegan Quinn has disclosed.

THE latest TNS/MRBI Poll showed an apparent recovery by Fianna Fáil from recent poor support levels and an apparent fall in support for Fine Gael.

THE PDs finally broke cover last night and launched a scathing attack on opposition leaders who branded them moral pygmies over the wave of sleaze allegations rocking Bertie Ahern’s premiership.

COMMUNICATIONS Minister Noel Dempsey has become the second Fianna Fáil member of Cabinet to say he would have no difficulty holding talks with the Green Party in post-election coalition negotiations.

A POLITICAL row blazed between Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil yesterday over claims that the country’s biggest party will lose several seats in Cork in next year’s general election.

THE chaos theory holds that a butterfly flapping its wings somewhere in the world can cause - through a whole series of connected events - carnage and catastrophe.

AS a Fianna Fáil supporter, I was amazed by the recent attack on Sinn Féin by Arts, Sport and Tourism Minister John O’Donoghue.

JUSTICE MINISTER Michael McDowell’s plan to introduce café bar licences is set to trigger the biggest backbench revolt in eight years of coalition government.

THE high voter turnout for yesterday's local and European Elections could well result in Fianna Fáil suffering heavy losses.