SF MEP in danger of losing seat

Sinn Fein’s Mary Lou McDonald appears to have an uphill battle trying to capture a seat.

As she waited for the full breakdown of results in Dublin Central, Mary Lou McDonald was not yet conceding defeat.

The Taoiseach Bertie Ahern was elected in his Dublin Central constituency on the first count.

Mr Ahern topped the poll with 12,734 votes.

Independent Tony Gregory and Labour’s Joe Costello were putting in strong challenges to defend their seat.

However the Sinn Féin MEP admitted it was a strong possibility.

“We’re not at that point yet,” she said.

“The votes are in. They’re being counted and the people have spoken and obviously we’ll accept it.

“We still have an awful lot of political work to do right across the state so we’ll take stock and keep going.”

The Dublin MEP said the small parties had been squeezed because the election had developed into a referendum on who would be Taoiseach.

“Obviously the people have overwhelmingly decided that that person is going to be Bertie Ahern,” she said.

“It (the election) became a battle of the big parties.”