John O Mahony To Run for FG in Mayo

Ive no idea if this has been picked up or not, however the Western People reports that Fine Gael is to run former football manager and current talking head on The Sunday Game John O’Mahony in Mayo. There had been two local Coucillors running for the nomination but after discussion with Enda Cllr Tom Connolly and Cllr John Cribben stepped aside to let O’Mahony through.

So Fine Gael have at least gotten one of their preffered football candidates, with Sean Kelly unlikely to run in South Kerry. However there are the usual answers (which never get suitably addressed) arising from the stories like this that emanate from time to time.

Firstly the whole idea of parachuting in a football manager over local councillors. Personally I dont have much of an issue with it (at least on the surface) the guy proved he could run a tight ship with Galway so at least he can manage. However there are high minded arugments about shoving public representatives in the form of councillors aside to make way for O’Mahony. What you are losing is expericence in the field of being a public representative and also the general understanding of local and party politics. For myself I prefer to see more diversity in the Dail and the potential influx of new ideas from different walks of life. The Dail can quickly become sclerotic if its all the same people talking the same talk from the same set of principles.

Secondly it serves to underline the personality driven nature of the electoral system. P O Neill wrote very well about this earlier and I wont go over it here, but what Fine Gael is clearly feeling is that a strong personality is more desirable than a capable(in the sense of being elected thus supported-Connolly is only two years into the job) local councillor. Does this not undermine the quality of our system that parties prefer to adopt high personality candidates ahead of high-ability? Now the two may not be mutually exclusive and I will have to sit on the fence for a time on the second question since Im quite partial to the whole PR-STV system. I don think however that stunts like this dont serve to strengthen the system unless the character and strength of the proposed candidate is made clear (as in the case of Colm O Gorman for example).

Finally just some additional background, O’Mahony is likely to be fighting the five seat Mayo constituency in the south/east region of the county.

Also some chat on politics.ie