ANALYSIS:His campaign broke new ground and proved drama is again a feature of presidential elections, writes STEPHEN COLLINS
DAVID NORRIS bowed to the inevitable yesterday and abandoned his campaign to get a nomination to run for the presidency. It was a dignified withdrawal after days of controversy and it throws the presidential election wide open.
Norris had little option following the withdrawal of support by a number of the 14 Oireachtas members who had pledged to back him. Three TDs, including the co-ordinator of the campaign in the Oireachtas, Finian McGrath, publicly withdrew on Monday night but others had privately indicated to the Trinity Senator that they could no longer back him.
It meant the prospects of getting 20 members of the Oireachtas to sign his nomination papers had all but vanished by yesterday morning. Coming on top of the departure of most of the senior members of his campaign team, the only sensible thing to do was to call it quits.
Some of his supporters were worried that Norris would try and battle on and suffer further humiliation in the process but, in the event, he took the right decision for himself and the presidency.
In his touching speech on the steps of his Dublin city centre house yesterday, he made the valid claim that his entry into the presidential race had resulted in a number of important achievements.
The first was that his decision forced an election, as it put paid to any prospect of an all-party agreement on an acceptable candidate. The second was that the process had raised the whole question of the way in which candidates are nominated. All of the major parties committed themselves back in 1998 to reforming the nomination process but nothing has happened since. Norris’s third achievement was to demonstrate that it was possible for a gay person to be seen as a viable candidate for the highest office in the land.
His campaign came to a premature end not because he was gay but because he acted foolishly in writing the now notorious letters on behalf of his former partner. A heterosexual candidate would have suffered similar consequences for behaving in the same way.
By withdrawing from the race with dignity and decorum, Norris has put an end to the controversy surrounding his actions and removed a potentially ugly issue from the presidential election campaign. He can continue to play an important role in Irish public life both inside the Seanad and outside it.
The exit of the leading candidate from the race has given all the other candidates grounds to hope that they can now develop the momentum required to make the winning post. It has also opened the door for another high-profile non-party candidate to join the contest.
The four candidates in the field will all obviously try and go after the Norris vote and all can make a strong case as to why they should benefit most. The two leading candidates, Gay Mitchell of Fine Gael and Michael D Higgins of the Labour Party, will try to recapture their own party supporters who were lining up to vote for Norris.
The Irish Times/Ipsos MRBI poll published two weeks ago showed that both of the party candidates were struggling to reach their own party supporters. Only 38 per cent of Fine Gael voters said they intended to vote for Mitchell, and Higgins didn't do much better with 39 per cent of Labour voters saying they would support him.
The poll figures also show that 24 per cent of Fine Gael supporters were prepared to vote for Norris and 25 per cent of Labour voters were lining up to do so. With Norris now out of the race, an obvious strategy for the two leading candidates is to chase up their own party supporters and try to win them over.
Mitchell can also take some comfort from the fact he was closely behind Norris as the leading contender in Dublin. They were far ahead of the other three in the capital and Norris’s departure gives Mitchell an opportunity to solidify his support base in his home city.
If the two party political candidates can take comfort from the departure of Norris, so can the two Independent candidates, Seán Gallagher and Mary Davis. Now that the Trinity Senator is gone, these two non-party candidates can capitalise on the fact that the electorate does not see the presidency as part of normal politics.
If they can get the public to focus on their campaigns, there is every chance that either of the Independents could pick up a lot more support than they were getting in the poll. Although she was narrowly behind him, Davis appears to be in a stronger position than Gallagher to gain from the departure of Norris.
Gallagher’s involvement with Fianna Fáil at a number of levels could tell against him when the public mood is still so hostile to that party. By contrast, Davis is associated in the public mind with the Special Olympics, which were such a huge success when they were staged in Ireland.
A big unknown that will have a vital bearing on the outcome is whether Fianna Fáil nominates a candidate. Éamon Ó Cuív did not do very well in the Irish Times poll but, since then, the party’s Munster MEP, Brian Crowley, has made it clear he wants to run.
Crowley has the potential to get a big Munster vote but that has to be weighed against the negative impact of the Fianna Fáil brand. Party leader Micheál Martin has a big call to make on the issue. If he kept his party out of the race he could help one of the Independents to become a real contender with the support of the core Fianna Fáil vote. On the other hand, by opting out he would give the party’s critics more ammunition to proclaim it was doomed.
One way or another, the 2011 campaign has proved again that drama, excitement and human frailty are a feature of presidential elections.
Stephen Collins is Political Editor