Presidential Election: IT'S McGUINNESS WOT WON IT

WHAT THE PAPERS SAY

FROM the reporting of the first tallies on Friday morning, October 28th, to the publication of Monday’s daily papers on October 31st, large sections of the Establishment Irish news media were making concerted efforts to recast not just the actual result of the Presidential election campaign but the last days of run-in to polling on the 27th.

It wasn’t just newspapers. It was the tone of RTÉ’s TV and radio commentary on the results and the various talk shows over the weekend across the commercial media.

The themes offered (in no particular order of bias) were:-

(1) Sinn Féin hadn’t done that well in the election, though it did perhaps cause bile in presenters’ mouths to have to continually acknowledge that Sinn Féin had come third in the election contest.

(2) 26-County – or ‘Southern voters’ as they like to describe themselves – were not ready for the ‘harsh edge’ of a Sinn Féin President.

(3) Martin McGuinness’s one question on the RTÉ Frontline programme after four other live TV and radio debates was proof of an orchestrated dirty tricks campaign by the party during the presidential election contest.

The Red Tops and Irish Mail on Saturday

Not all the news media fell into these ruts but many slipped easily into the old mantra of ‘Sinn Féin bad, everyone else good’.

The Irish Sun can’t tear itself away from the language of the battlefield. So we are told that “Former IRA commander Martin McGuinness” was deemed to have come in “a credible third place”. The questioning between McGuiness and Seán Gallagher on the Frontline debate is described as McGuinness having “put the boot into Gallagher’s image” and that Gallagher had accused McGuinness of “mounting an ambush to take him out”.

This language continues in the Sun editorial titled “It’s D Day” and they claim that Gallagher “allowed McGuinness to shoot him in the foot”. “Shot down on Frontline” was an inside page headline splashed across two pages in the Irish Mirror.

It was good and bad in a separate commentary by Pat Flanagan who wrote that McGuinness had “laid a landmine question” to “blow his [Gallagher’s] Presidential election dreams to kingdom come”. But at least Flanagan did acknowledge that “Sinn Féin will be happy enough with its support and will be celebrating taking out a proxy Fianna Fáil President”. True on both counts, Pat.

The Star editorial pronounces that “Sinn Féin would have hoped to do much better” but doesn’t tell us what that measure would be.

The Daily Mail lost the run of themselves and had cartoon images on their front page of a Celtic Higgins on a horse with an Irish wolfhound by his side. “Higgins Slays the Dragon” is the headline, brushing over the fact that it was, in fact, McGuinness, while Michael D stood watching like a damsel in distress.

Inside, the Mail tells us that McGuinness finished a “distant third” and also talked of a Frontline “ambush”. Suzanne Breen declares that the result was “a good, though not great result for Sinn Féin” and takes a whole column analysing the party’s performance without one quote or reference to having interviewed any party members to complete her piece. Though at least the strapline does declare that “McGuinness’s stunning intervention put Sinn Féin on the map”.

The broadsheets on Saturday

It is the Irish Independent claiming they led the way on Seán Gallagher’s link to “secret FF fund-raiser” and they reproduced the October 20th front page that made the initial claims. Interestingly, this is not mentioned in any other news media as being an ‘ambush’.

The Independent also recognises that “Martin McGuinness’s third place ranking has given Sinn Féin an electoral boost” and makes the point that the party are “up almost 4%” compared to the February general election.

Caroline O’Doherty in the Examiner writes in an article headlined “McGuinness bags the Áras for rival candidate” that Sinn Féin “can be reasonably satisfied”.

The weird world of vote counting lived in by Harry McGee of The Irish Times is dealt with in a separate article; Eoghan Harris and Odran Flynn are dealt with there too. Paul Cullen reports that Sinn Féin “plans to build on its relative success”. Fintan O’Toole keeps up the war language when he writes of “Martin McGuinness’s controlled explosion on the Frontline debate”. Stephen Collins also talks of Seán Gallagher being “ambushed” by McGuinness in an article titled “Gifted amateur no match for seasoned professional”.

The Sundays

The outpouring of sympathy for Seán Gallagher (crocodile tears to you and me) continued in the Sunday Independent. Gallagher and his wife, Trish, are pictured on the front page of a photo titled “Rising above dirty tricks”. It’s mentioned in the article also: a “dirty tricks campaign by Sinn Féin”.

John Drennan writes inside of “The SF strongholds that imploded”. He too – like Eoghan Harris, McGee and Flynn – refuses to introduce the idea of turn-out to his analysis; and, yes, he doesn’t actually quote any Sinn Féin representatives and, no, the increased vote share, the gains in 31 out of 38 constituencies . . . We could go on.

Eoghan Harris is obsessing about RTÉ for daring to report that “Sinn Féin polls well”. I wonder even if he was made head of RTÉ, the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland and Independent News and Media Group would that really make him happy? No, I didn’t think so either.

Brendan O’Connor, like others, uses the language of war and one of his articles is headlined “TV bomb was explosive, decisive . . .  and dodgy”. Maybe someone should show him the Irish Independent front page that claims responsibility – was that “dodgy”, Brendan?

The red tops on Sunday are all about Michael D Higgins but The Sunday Times still finds space to write about Seán Gallagher being “ambushed” by McGuinness, both in an article and the editorial.

I’m particularly liking the headline to a whole page inside article by Sarah McInerney and Stephen O’Brien. It has a large photo of McGuinness in conversation with Higgins under the title: “You owe me one”.