This is what Public pushback can achieve . Fine Gael’s 10 Tipperary Councillors announced that they will make their own nomination decision on the presidential election, despite the Dictat coming from party headquarters saying that they should block any independent candidate from entering the field to contest the race for the Aras. These Fine Gael Councillors are clearly aware of the massive public backlash to the restrictive and undemocratic nomination selection process for the presidential elections. They know that the Irish people are closely watching the presidential elections and will call them out if they, as public representatives, accede to the undemocratic demands of the Tánaiste to block independent candidates, over the will of the people. This is precisely why the 1998 Third Progress Report of the All-Party Oireachtas Committee on the Constitution recommended that Article 12.4.2° procedures for nominating presidential candidate by 20 TDs or 4 councils was too RESTRICTIVE and in need of DEMOCRATISATION. The Committee proposed that POPULAR NOMINATION would give the people an opportunity to nominate candidates directly with tightly drawn up procedures that not less than 10,000 citizens could nominate a candidate for presidential elections. This report was buried by successive governments and not acted upon as it suits their interests to hold the presidential elections to ransom. What we are presently witnessing is the exposure of our deeply undemocratic presidential elections. We need a complete overhaul, so that the Irish people can exercise their Constitutional right to directly elect the President of Ireland, as recommended by the Oireachtas Committee over 27 years ago.

Posted by Fred Bassett