Candidates singing the same tune 24 years on

MICHEÁL MARTIN will lead Fianna Fáil into the February 2011 general election exactly 24 years after being rejected by the people of Cork South Central at his first attempt for a Dáil seat.

A disappointing 3,619 first preferences saw the young teacher from Turner’s Cross placed eighth out of 16 candidates and eliminated after the sixth count, 14 months after winning a seat on Cork Corporation.

But — apart from the Mr Bean-lookalike mugshot — a glance at Mr Martin’s segment of the FF leaflet that fell into homes across the city’s southside might make you think it was 2011 and not February 1987.

Bemoaning the plight of 100,000 emigrants and a quarter of a million unemployed people, he appealed to voters for a chance to help him try and reverse these trends. “Ireland is very much a land of youth. It is sad, therefore, to see the young leaving us. It is our duty to give them the work that will keep them, their energy, and their talents in this country.”

Alas, his appeal was unsuccessful but his transfers did help party colleagues John Dennehy and Batt O’Keeffe secure their places in the Dáil, where he would join O’Keeffe and replace Dennehy just over two years later after the 1989 election.

If a week is a long time in politics — which it certainly was for a man who failed to topple Brian Cowen from the helm of Fianna Fáil eight days ago — the rest of the party’s 1987 leaflet also shows how little changes between generations.

“Do I want another unstable coalition government?” Cork voters were told to ask themselves.

“Do I want a party of a few deputies holding the country to ransom? Do I want a programme for government cobbled together after the election?”

A lot of voters may well be asking themselves the same questions after watching how some independent TDs left the fate of the Finance Bill hanging in the balance up to yesterday morning and with no indications that any party is going to form a majority government after Election 2011.

* For canvassing material from the present day going back more years than many candidates would like you to remember, visit the Irish Election Literature Blog: http://irishelectionliterature.wordpress.com.