A LARGE number of longstanding Fianna Fáil Senators have defied the wishes of party leader Micheál Martin by declaring as candidates for the forthcoming Seanad elections.
Mr Martin wanted older Senators to step aside to facilitate younger members with the potential to go on and win Dáil seats. Fourteen of the 25 outgoing Fianna Fáil Senators were among the 80 candidates proposed by approved bodies for the Seanad’s five vocational panels as nominations closed yesterday, including Donie Cassidy, Jim Walsh, Mary White, Ann Ormonde, Terry Leyden and John Hanafin. Former ministers of state Martin Mansergh and Seán Connick have also been nominated, as has Kenneth O’Flynn, a son of former Cork North Central TD Noel O’Flynn.
As many as five other Fianna Fáil Senators (including James Carroll and the newly appointed Senator Darragh O’Brien) will be among those chosen on the “inside” panel by the party’s Oireachtas members on Monday. That will bring the total to 19. More candidates are expected to be added by the party leadership on Monday but Fianna Fáil can win 12 seats at most.
The party’s deputy leader, Mary Hanafin, who lost her seat in Dún Laoghaire, said she could not contest the Seanad election as well as her brother and would no longer be deputy leader. However, she remained interested in “future political life”.