Fine Gael’s presidential contenders well versed in EU affairs

A Fine Gael candidate has never held the position of President of Ireland but the party is confident this will change with the election later in the year.

Fianna Fáil has shown no signs of having a winning candidate, Labour has a number of contenders and the best known Independent to date, Senator David Norris, is mired in controversy.

Fine Gael, on the other hand, has three contenders so far for the nomination, which will largely be decided by the parliamentary party with 70% of the vote. The large number of party councillors share 20% and the executive council has a tie-breaking 10% of the nomination vote.

All three candidates have very strong EU links, with two of them — Gay Mitchell and Mairead McGuinness — currently members of the European Parliament. The third, Pat Cox, is a former MEP and the only Irish president of the powerful institution.

The party hierarchy apparently favours Mr Cox, who will no doubt clear the final hurdle to his admission to the Fine Gael race by being elected a member of the party following his application last week to his local branch in Cork.

Mairead McGuinness, who, like Mr Cox, first came to prominence from her job with RTÉ, has had her hat in the ring for some time. Strangely enough, the biggest problem she was always going to face was that she was a woman. Apparently, after two female presidents, the politicians reckon the public will have had enough of women and want to take back the job for one of the boys again.

Mr Mitchell’s entry into the race was unexpected since he had ruled himself out some months ago. But the former lord mayor of Dublin, it is said, was prompted by the emergence of Mr Cox to become a candidate.

Fianna Fáil members will recognise some of the tensions within Fine Gael now, as resentment at not getting cabinet posts rises to the surface. Mr Cox, with his roots as a founding member of the Progressive Democrats, joining the party to seek the nomination is bringing these feelings to the surface.

As such, Mr Mitchell will be their ideal representative given his quarter century in the Dáil, his never getting a full cabinet position, his years of thankless work at the forefront of referenda and elections and his decision to stick with Europe rather than run in the general election earlier this year.

All three are well known in Brussels. Apart from his work on the development and economic committees, Mr Mitchell is a co-founder of the European Parliament’s Working Group on Human Dignity, linked to the Dignitatis Humanae Institute that has groups in several governments. Mainly a traditional Catholic organisation, they say their aim is to promote human dignity worldwide, recognising that “Man is made in the image and likeness of God”.

Mr Cox has maintained his links in Brussels where he has been a lobbyist for some high-profile companies like Microsoft and has always been on call to give lectures on issues of Irish concern such as the Lisbon referenda.

Fianna Fáil failed to reward him by nominating him as commissioner — even in 2004, when the possibility of his becoming president of the European Commission existed.

He carried out some work for Fine Gael during the election and, unlike Fianna Fáil, the party hierarchy appear determined to reward him with at least a chance at becoming the country’s next president.

They argue that we need a person well versed in EU affairs in the job. Perhaps if Mr Mitchell or Ms McGuinness wins the nomination, they may promise Mr Cox the commissioner’s job in 2014.

The more things change, the more they remain the same, as the French say.