GALWAY EAST – RECOUNT STARTS AT 9AM

Date Published: 27-Feb-2011

BY DECLAN TIERNEY

A recount of votes has been ordered after two votes separated two candidates after the seventh count in Galway East.

Fine Gael’s Tom McHugh requested the recount after he finished two votes adrift of Independent candidate Timmy Broderick from Kilconnell.

It meant that Tom McHugh would have been eliminated after this count and this is why he ordered the recount in the hope of staying in the election.

Both candidates still trail Labour’s Colm Keaveney by just over 260 votes which makes him the favourite to take the fourth seat. Paul Connaughton jnr of Fine Gael, Ciaran Cannon of Fine Gael and Fianna Fail’s Micheal Kitt have already seats secured although none of them had yet reached the quota by the seventh count.

The recount will commence at 9 a.m. and it is expected that a final result will be known around the middle of the day.