Naughten looks a ‘dead cert’ to top poll

Denis Naughten is a dead cert to win the first seat in the Roscommon-Galway constituency and likely to be elected on the first county, with an estimated 13,000 first preferences according to the tallymen.

The unofficial tally has also put fellow Independent Mick Fitzmaurice a shoo-in to retain his seat but he will have to wait longer to get elected, with 9,479 first preferences counted in the agreed tally.

The real story from the Hyde Park count centre will be the battle for third place, with just 56 votes separating Fine Gael’s Maura Hopkins and FIanna Fail’s Eugene Murphy.

That will be decided on where Naughten’s 1,500-plus transfers go, with local pundits predicting many of them will go to Hopkins, who should benefit from being in the same gene pool as Naughten before he jumped ship to the Independents over the closure of the Emergency Department of the Roscommon Hospital.

However, with a national backlash against the outgoing coalition parties  evident across many traditional voting heartlands, none of the political diehards in this new constituency are certain what way the geography patterns will fall.

At this stage Claire Kerrane (SF) is thought to be out of the race with just under 3,000 votes in the tally.

The first count is predicted to come by 3pm.