Leo and Lucinda grapple for the limelight but Enda secures the faithful following

EGO dominated Enda Kenny’s big set-piece bash of the campaign.

But the mild-mannered Mayo man was not responsible for the outbreak of unbridled Hubris himself.

Mr Kenny used the Aviva Stadium rally to show he was ready to be Taoiseach, while two of his most ambitious Fine Gael critics used it show they were ready to take over should he prove not up to the job after all.

Mr Kenny gave a genuinely impressive performance, speaking well and with passion, and not lapsing into that silly, shouty-throaty voice he often mistakes for sincerity.

But Enda had to fight for the limelight as Fine Gael’s very own attention-junkie twins, Lucinda Creighton and Leo Varadkar attempted to outdo each other in vanity politics.

Ms Creighton is to political publicity generation what the national grid is to electricity supply, and she never misses a chance to plug herself into the main frame. Like Madonna and Jesus, Ms Creighton now feels she is so ubiquitous in our lives she can dispense with such tiresome tokens of ordinariness as surnames, so Enda’s event was to some extent hijacked to become a bit of a Lucinda-fest with her barrage of excited supporters waving large, diamond shaped banners bearing such legends as “Lucinda: Honesty”, “Lucinda: Courage”, and “Lucinda: Truth”.

Presumably the poor Blueshirt flunky saddled with the placard: “Lucinda: Bringer of World Peace” had got mugged on the way to the stadium.

But at least the event was in Ms Creighton’s own constituency and she had some right to make her presence felt, not so Fine Gael’s other publicity-seeking missile, Mr Varadkar (he thinks YouTube should be renamed MeTube) who turned up with six life-size cardboard cut-outs of himself.

It certainly showed those who accuse him of being just a one-dimensional Thatcherite — he was, in fact, half a dozen one dimensional Thatcherites yesterday.

The number of Leos was even too much to bear for some Fine Gaelers, one activist said on seeing the volley of Varadkars: “That’s kind of disturbing, I’m actually quite frightened now.”

Not for the first time, Leo then looked down on Enda, as Varadkar groupies bore the 6ft cutouts above their heads as Mr Kenny spoke — the cutouts dipping and rising due to the tiredness of the Leo lackeys’ arms made it look as if the Leos were performing a one man Mexican wave.

Strangely, Newstalk’s George Hook MC’d this ultimate party political event. Whatever next — Dobbo fronting the Socialist Alliance campaign? Jedward presenting PrimeTime?

But Mr Kenny successfully used it to hit back hard at Fianna Fáil claims he had not been up-front about his pension nest egg from his days as a teacher.

It is quite telling that after starting on the back foot, Mr Kenny has grown in confidence throughout the campaign, while Micheál Martin, who seized the early initiative, has become increasingly ratty as the election has worn on and is now reduced to routinely trying to bully radio and TV hosts for daring to expect him to answer their questions rather than let him use their shows as party political broadcasts.

After branding Mr Martin a “guttersnipe”, Mr Kenny insisted his five-point plan for recovery was “forensically” realistic — CSI: Fine Gael, in other words.

There was an almost evangelical feel to the rally, the faithful knew Enda was about to lead them out of the wilderness and activists had been guided to the Aviva gathering by a star — Fine Gael’s glowing star symbol which heralded the way to the place of worship.

Rumours even began to circulate that the blessed Enda would descend from a fiery chariot — but in the end he used the stairs like everyone else. As he left the podium, the crowd of believers surged to touch the hem of his garment (a rather natty navy suit) for verily he has performed a miracle — on the cusp of making FG the biggest Dáil party for the first time in 25 general elections.

Enda looked as if he was master of all he surveyed — the ambitious egos who would oust him are, for now, stranded.