Luke 'Ming' Flanagan says he will consider running in next year's presidential election. He is on course to retain his MEP seat, with the fifth day of counting for the Midlands Northwest constituency which started at 9 o'clock this morning. He leads by over 20,000 votes and is within 10,000 votes of the quota of 113,000, after 16 counts.
Fine Gael's Maria Walsh and Nina Carberry, and Fianna Fáil's Barry Cowan, look certain to take three of the other four seats. Ming has also not ruled out running for the Áras when Michael D Higgins' term ends in 2025: "I certainly would [consider it]. Sure, why wouldn't I?" he asked our reporter at the count centre, Eoghan Murphy, "There's an election on next year and I'd certain;y have to think about it. I don't know would I but, I'd certainly have to think about it. What attracts me is democracy and the idea that anyone can go out there and put their name on a ballot paper.
"It would prove that someone who initially only got 548 votes in a general election can get elected to the European parliament three times in a row," the MEP continued, "It shows democracy works and if I was to go down that road in a presidential election that's what I'd be running on: the basis that democracy does work and it is the route to take and no other route should be thought about."
The fifth and final seat in Midlands Northwest is between Ballyleague/Lanesboro's Ciaran Mullooly and Sinn Fein's Michelle Gildernew. Mullooly's leading the Tyrone woman by 18,000 votes, but Gildernew is expected to make up a lot of ground when her running mate, Chris McManus, is eliminated. Gildernew insists she is still in with a shout of winning the final seat. Tallies indicate she got 26 per cent of first-preference votes in Monaghan, which pleased her: "Well, Monaghan's practically my home," the MP said from the count centre, "I grew up right beside it and was in and out of it all the time and we'd cross from Tyrone into Monaghan.
"I only live on the other side of Aughnacloy so, we're very close and I know lots of people and the characters around Monaghan - there's plenty of them. I'm very grateful to all the people who voted but yes, I 've got a special wee grá for people of Monaghan given the great vote that came out of it."
