Enda Kenny, a man not to be underestimated

Few people truly witnessed Enda Kenny’s “patient, steely determination” until he fought off the heave against his leadership of Fine Gael in 2010, RTÉ broadcaster Sean O’Rourke has said.

But it had always been there, as evidenced by the conditions Mr Kenny laid down to run for politics in the first place, he said.

This was in 1975 when Fine Gael asked him to run in the by-election caused by the death of his father, the late junior minister Henry.

Mr Kenny agreed — on condition the junior ministry did not go to the other Fine Gael TD in the constituency, Myles Staunton.

Mr O’Rourke was speaking at the launch of a biography of Mr Kenny.

The book, by political journalist and former government adviser John Downing, is entitled Enda Kenny: The Unlikely Taoiseach. Mr O’Rourke said it was aptly named, given that few people ever gave Mr Kenny a chance of becoming Taoiseach.

“We’re reminded a great deal about who Enda Kenny is... a splendid presentation of the story of a man you would underestimate at your peril, as many people I think have found to their cost,” he said of the book.

Mr Downing is a former political editor of the Irish Examiner.