Political battles loom large in Limerick ahead of local elections

WE MAY be less than a week into 2024, but already jostling for position ahead of June’s local elections has started.

Expect canvassers and candidates to be eagerly knocking at your doors in the coming months - if they haven’t started doing so already - as Limerick gears up to go to the polls on Friday, June 7.

Already, the vast majority of party tickets have been filled and with 40 seats up for grabs, competition will be intense across the city and county.

In the Metropolitan District, there are 21 seats on offer, across three seven-seater wards.

Elsewhere, in County Limerick, there are three municipal districts - Adare-Rathkeale and Newcastle West, both with six seats, and Cappamore-Kilmallock which will return seven councillors.

In three of these areas, the retirement of local political ‘big beasts’ has left the contests wide open.

In Adare-Rathkeale, former mayor, councillor Kevin Sheahan will step down after almost 40 years in local politics, opening up an intriguing battle in his home town of Askeaton.

Here, another ex-first citizen, councillor Michael Sheahan of Fine Gael, has taken the decision to move from the City East LEA, an area he has been elected in since 2009 to Adare-Rathkeale, and the town he grew up in.

Fianna Fail is running Ger Ward, who is based close to Askeaton, alongside Adare-based councillor Bridie Collins and Trina O’Dea from Croom.

In the south of the county, Mayor Gerald Mitchell caused surprise in local political circles in November by announcing he would retire from politics after a decade on council.

A big vote-getter in Hospital, the move has caused his own Fine Gael party something of a headache, as its two candidates (for Cappamore/Kilmallock), Noreen Stokes and Greg Conway are based in Pallasgreen and Kilmallock respectively.

The pair came agonisingly close to being elected in 2019, and will be hoping Cllr Mitchell’s decision will boost their chances.
Fianna Fail is running veteran Kilmallock councillor Mike Donegan again, alongside Al Fitzgerald, based in Knocklong and Caherconlish man Dinny Hourigan.

Another former mayor stepping down in the summer is James Collins, a polltopper in 2019 and a Fianna Fail general election candidate the following year.

Although he would never publicly admit it, fellow City West councillor Daniel Butler - a neighbour of councillor Collins in the Raheen/Dooradoyle area - will be aiming to head the poll - he came within 60 votes of doing so five years ago.

Councillor Butler insisted: “My focus is to keep working hard over the next six months, and whatever that leads to, it leads to. I never think about votes. I'm happy to put the work in and hopefully get a result. Whatever happens after that is out of my control.”

In City West - a constituency which stretches from the city centre to the green fields of Patrickswell and Ballybrown - Fine Gael will run three candidates - sitting councillors Daniel Butler and Dan McSweeney and making a political debut, Michael MacCurtain, who works for Limerick Chamber.

So far, Fianna Fail has picked just one candidate - Isabel Aherne from Patrickswell.

But it’s anticipated more will be added in the weeks to come.

Unlike with some smaller local authorities, no single party has been able to seize an overall majority since the establishment of a single authority for Limerick city and county.

It’s led to Fine Gael and Fianna Fail teaming up, and carving up most jobs among themselves.

Councillor Conor Sheehan, who is standing again for Labour in City North hopes this stranglehold can be broken after June.

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“Politics is becoming much more splintered. Maybe on the next council, you might need three, maybe four parties to control things. I personally think that having two large parties carving everything up between themselves is not a good way to do business,” he said.

Councillor Sheehan said Labour may run a candidate in rural Limerick for the first time in a decade at the local election.

Otherwise, it’s a case of as you were with councillors Joe Leddin (City West) and Elena Secas (City East) on the party’s ticket.

Given their position in the national opinion polls, Sinn Fein would be fancied to take seats across Limerick, with the party running candidates in each ward, and more than one in some areas.

One of these places is in Cappamore-Kilmallock, where councillor PJ Carey of Kilmallock was elected - admittedly to his own surprise - as an Independent in 2019.

He’s since joined Sinn Fein and will be joined on the party ticket by Audrey Byrnes from Murroe.

Five years ago, however, Sinn Fein was expected to build on the six council seats it won in 2014.

However, in a disastrous showing, it only emerged with two councillors.

The showing was considered bizarre given its performance at the general election just eight months later.

“We need to get our vote out, and we did not get our vote out in the 2019 local election. That’s not even up for debate,” said Senator Paul Gavan, who will fly the Sinn Fein flag in the European election taking place on the same day as the local authority poll.

“One of the key messages we want to bring to the electorate is that if they want to see change at national level, the local election is a beginning to that change. Local councillors elect the Seanad. If we don’t change the make-up of local government in Limerick and across the State, we won’t get the change we want from a new government after that.”

There is one familiar face back in the running for Sinn Fein - Malachy McCreesh in City West, who narrowly lost his seat in 2019.

At the time he was eliminated, he said he would likely not run again, but he’s since had a change of heart.

Another candidate who is putting his name before the public again is Michael Ryan, a former principal of Our Lady Queen of Peace in Janesboro.

In 2019, he hoped to capitalise on this by running in City East for the Aontu party.

Now, having moved back to his home parish of Pallasgreen, he will try his luck with the same party in the Cappamore-Kilmallock municipal district.

Ireland’s newest political party, Independent Ireland will be hoping to make a breakthrough, in Limerick and elsewhere, at this summer’s election.

Limerick TD Richard O’Donoghue, who is the director general of the upstart group is keeping tight-lipped about who they could run.

However, he admitted that meetings were held with prospective candidates at the Woodlands House Hotel in Adare before Christmas.

Already confirmed to be in its number is Independent councillor Frankie Daly, who will fly their flag in the general election.

He topped the poll in City North with almost 400 votes to spare in 2019.

“There will be a lot of work done into the new year, and I would hope that sometime early in the new year we’ll be launching the party officially then,” said Mr O'Donoghue.

“We’ll launch our candidates then. I don’t want to pre-empt anything. But we are talking to everyone. We want to talk to people who want to make a difference and rebuild counties.”

It remains to be seen if any of the sitting independents - many of them formerly of Fine Gael and Fianna Fail - will join up with Independent Ireland.

Fianna Fail TD and Minister of State Niall Collins said while he's not underestimating the challenge of former party members, now Independents, he added: “There are challenges everywhere. Everybody is a challenge. We just concentrate on our own candidates, on their campaigns and what they can do for their communities.”

The Social Democrats, which made its local breakthrough in 2019 with the election of Elisa O’Donovan in City West, are running three candidates.

Councillor O’Donovan is joined by Shane Hickey-O’Meara in City North and Donnah Vuma in the City East Local Electoral Area.