Fine Gael has been rocked by the resignation from the party of the current mayor of Tralee but the senior coalition party will be relieved that he does not intend contenting the local elections as an independent candidate.
Veteran politician Cllr Pat Hussey was furious when he failed to secure a nomination to contest the local elections. He complained his way had been blocked by a gender quota directive issued by party headquarters which insisted one of the three candidates selected had to be female.
He has informed FG bosses of his decision and he said he has no regrets after a 35-year involvement going back to the days when Garret Fitzgerald was at the helm.
“It’s better to walk alone than to walk in the wrong direction,” he remarked.
“It’s a monkey off my back. I was on the wrong train for quite some time,” he said.
Cllr Hussey said he expected to be treated more fairly by the party and he was angry that the gender quota directive blocked him from running and led to him withdrawing his name from convention.
“We were handy for church gate collections and for knocking on doors,” he said.
In a further blow for Fine Gael in Kerry, a long-serving party member and well-known community activist also quit the organisation.
Donal O’Sullivan from Killorglin, a former cumann chairman who has been a party member for the past 25 years, will contest the local elections as an independent.
Mr O’Sullivan, chairman of the Killorglin Tidy Towns group and a member of several high-profile community organisations, was unsuccessful in his bid to secure a FG nomination for the South-West Kerry constituency.
There is more stability in the Fine Gael organisation in the Killarney electoral area where outgoing county councillors Bobby O’Connell and John Sheahan will be joined by town council member Cathal Walshe, a first-time county council candidate who will be hoping to poll well in the urban area.
