Main parties support Higgins to save costs on running a candidate

So we’re going to have an election for the office of the presidency. That’s very good news. As of now, it’s likely to be a two-candidate race, with a strong possibility of a third (maybe even a fourth) comingthrough the local authority route. That’s better.

The bad news though is that two of the three largest parties in Ireland have turned their backs on the office. Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, for self-serving reasons, have decided not to contest it, and instead to throw their weight behind the incumbent president. Labour has also decided to support Michael D Higgins, but that’s understandable. They nominated him seven years ago and fought to get him elected. If he had needed a nomination this time, which of course he didn’t, they would naturally have nominated him to contest.

But both FG and FF opposed Michael D the last time, in the case of Fianna Fáil through a sort of surrogate candidate in the form of Sean Gallagher. There’s never been a moment in Michael D’s career as a Labour representative — and it’s been a long career, because he first ran for election almost 50 years ago — when he wasn’t opposed by the other two parties.