Green Party TD Eamon Ryan, who withdrew his name on Saturday as a candidate for the presidential elections, has accepted that his bid may not have been properly planned. Mark Hennessy, Political Correspondent, reports from Darrara, Clonakilty.
After the Green Party's five-hour National Council meeting agreed not to run a candidate in the elections, Mr Ryan said "perhaps it was a rash decision" to put his name forward for the Presidency.
Stressing that National Council delegates had reached their decision by consensus, the Dublin South TD said: "The position was very much one of overwhelming support for me as a candidate, but also of acceptance of the argument that I made to the meeting that, unfortunately, it is not now possible to proceed."
Each of the 38 delegates attending the National Council meeting outside Clonakilty had been mandated to back Mr Ryan's campaign, subject to financial and organisational demands. However, a briefing by former party general secretary Mr Stiofáin Tutty on the cost of a possible campaign and on the organisational pressures it would create heavily influenced delegates, some said later.
"If the vote had been taken five minutes into the meeting, it would have been 'Yes'," said Clare county councillor Mr Brian Meaney.
During his speech, which came well into the meeting, Mr Ryan advised delegates not to approve his selection as a presidential election candidate and announced his withdrawal. Speaking afterwards, Mr Ryan said it had not become clear to him until Friday that he would not be able to get the necessary 20 Oireachtas nomination signatures.
He said he had placed some Independent TDs and senators in "difficult, pressurised" positions.
Asked if he had acted rashly, Mr Ryan said: "There are those within my own party who would make that call and perhaps they are right ... Perhaps the timing wasn't right, but I can only say that it was based on pure conviction to set out our political agenda.
"It may not have been thought through enough. It may have been done in a timescale that couldn't be achieved. My failing there is one of conviction, not anything else.
"The play for a candidacy was made on conviction - on a conviction that this country needs to have a debate about Ireland and the wider world, about the quality of life that we have in a rapidly changing country."
However, the party had to be practical: "Sometimes you have to look at the political reality on the ground as well as being full of political conviction."
Fears that the Greens would not be able to fund the campaign had played a major part in the final outcome, as had the "huge stress" of the last week.
The "heat and passion" displayed during the National Council proved to him, he said, that he had been right to seek a nomination:
" It may not have come to pass this time, but it will in the future.
"The Green Party is going on from here. We are on fire at the moment."
The party leader, Mr Trevor Sargent, said: "At this point, we are not going to be able to do justice to someone of the calibre of Eamon Ryan in the four-plus weeks to polling day."
Mr Sargent said he had spoken at the end of the meeting, "having heard everybody", and "agreed with the consensus of the meeting" that a campaign was not possible.
"It is to Eamon's credit that he saw that writing on the wall also, even though he is absolutely full of conviction and believes that he would have done an excellent job, which we believe also."
The "enthusiasm" generated would now be directed towards the upcoming by-elections in Kildare North and Meath, and, subsequently, towards the general election.
He said he respected "the difficulties" that had been caused within the Labour Party, following its decision not to put Mr Michael D. Higgins forward.
"It did make for very, very real political difficulties if the Labour Party was going to be the major stakeholder in providing the nominations for Eamon Ryan, a Green Party candidate.
"We were hoping that we could get eight, perhaps nine more Independents but as the circumstances played out, it is not now going to be possible to get those signatures."
The party's deputy leader, Cllr Mary White, who had been opposed to a campaign, described the debate as "a reality check". "The party realised that we would love to go with Eamon but the resources weren't there."