Sinn Féin to look closely at what went wrong

Sinn Féin will be carrying out a post mortem on the party’s support in Galway West after failing to win a seat, despite an exceptionally strong first preference vote.

Senator Trevor Ó Clochartaigh believes that locally, voters “shied away” from giving the party their first preference and transfers because Sinn Féin became mired in controversy in the fortnight before the General Election.

Despite this, he polled 5,755 first preference votes – up more than 50% on his 3,808 polled in the 2011 election.

He told the Connacht Tribune: “There is certainly a sense that ‘Slab’ Murphy, the Special Criminal Court and some economic stuff as well saw us drop 3% to 4% nationally in the last two weeks, and this affected the transfers we were getting, but I was also in the mix with strong competition from Ó Cuív, Kyne and Catherine Connolly.

“There was a concerted effort by the national media to damage Sinn Féin, and I think it shied them (voters) from giving us a vote,” said Senator Ó Clochartaigh.

He said the party has not yet regrouped to study the Galway West figures, but will be doing a thorough analysis – particularly of the tallies – in the coming weeks.

Senator Ó Clochartaigh said he does not feel he should have had a running mate in the city to bolster support.

“We’ll do a thorough analysis of it, but I don’t think it was a crucial factor, because I got transfers from the city and rural areas, including decent transfers from Mike Cubbard (+400) and Niall ÓTuathail (+622), while Seán Kyne was the one not really getting any transfers,” he said.

Senator Ó Clochartaigh made it to the final count with a total of 8,077 votes, up more than 72% on his final vote in 2011, when he was eliminated in the Count 9 (of 13) with 4,683.

He said he hopes to be on the Sinn Féin ticket for the next General Election, and will also be putting his name forward for the Seanad election later this year.