It’s Goodbye Mary-Lou…but why?

By Dónal Hassett

Outgoing Sinn Féin MEP Mary Lou McDonald was seen by many as the poster girl for Sinn Fein's attempt to extend its political hegemony south across the border. Appointed as Gerry Adams number 2, McDonald’s clean cut image and soft-spoken accent went down very well with Southern voters and her spearheading of the party’s anti-Lisbon campaign was very successful, playing on her extensive knowledge of European affairs to add to a traditional protest vote. So where did it all go wrong for the Sinn Fein golden girl?

With the Dublin constituency losing a seat this time around, it was always going to be hard fo Sinn Fein to retain their seat but with the capital predicted to return an anti-Lisbon candidate, Mary Lou was seen to have the edge over Fianna Fáil’s Eoin Ryan, victim of the tide of public anger against the Soldiers of Destiny. Few commentators would have predicted socialist stalwart Joe Higgins’ surprise victory in the early hours of Monday morning. While Higgins is renowned for his extraordinary commitment, irreproachable integrity and witty eloquence, his victory cannot be purely attributed to his strength as a candidate but also to a failure on Sinn Fein's part to monopolise the radical protest vote in the capital. While Higgins’ Socialist Party held their own in the local elections and the radical left People before Profit Alliance made important gains, Sinn Fein actually lost council seats on Dublin City Council.

So what lies behind Sinn Fein's failure in this crucial constituency? Firstly, the concerns raised about Mary Lou’s attendance in Brussels and Strasbourg, the lowest of all of Ireland’s MEPs even when maternity leave was discounted, undermined her reputation as a hard worker and probably lost her votes to Joe Higgins, who is universally recognised as extremely hard-working. Sinn Fein's local problems in a former stronghold of theirs in Dublin’s South Inner City may have compounded Mary Lou’s problem. Esther Uzell, whose brother Joseph Rafferty was murdered by people linked to the IRA, led a campaign which succeeded in unseating high-profile Sinn Fein councillor Daithí Doolan for his alleged failure to help catch the killers. The backlash against Sinn Fein in their own backyard may have impacted on Mary Lou’s first preference vote.

However, local issues aside, perhaps it is simply a case of Sinn Fein having peaked after a sudden surge in the wake of the Good Friday agreement and now the party’s support has levelled out at circa 10% across the Republic. The last Dáil elections actually resulted in the loss of a seat, Seán Crowe in Tallaght, and Mary Lou’s own much mooted candidacy in Dublin Central was a big disappointment. Sinn Fein stalwart, Chirsty Burke’s poor performance (around 9.5%) in the Dublin Central by-election seems to confirm Sinn Fein's stagnation, a percentage mirrored by the much vaunted candidacy of Padraig Mac Lochlainn in the North West Euro constituency. Toireasa Ferris' large vote in the South constituency, while promising for the party, was doomed by Sinn Fein's notorious inability to attract transfers. Bairbre de Brún’s poll-topping performance north of the Border seems unlikely to be emulated in the South for years to come.

What then for Mary Lou? While the golden girl of ‘respectable republicanism’ is now left without an elected position, we are sure to see plenty of her in the upcoming Lisbon campaign and with the government looking increasingly unstable perhaps she will be knocking at doors in the near future (though not in Dublin Central) in her bid to get into the Dáil. Or might we see Mary Lou trying to fulfil that dearly-held Sinn Fein ambition of taking the Áras in time for the centenary celebrations of 1916, though I’m sure her former European colleagues, newly re-elected MEPs Mairéad McGuinness and Brian Crowley, may well give her a run for her money.