COUNT 10 for Limerick’s first ever directly-elected mayor has seen Fine Gael candidate Daniel Butler bow out.
His 13,632 votes were not enough to keep him in in the campaign, leaving only three candidates in the race; frontrunner John Moran (IND), Helen O’Donnell (IND) and Fianna Fáil’s Dee Ryan.
Speaking to the Limerick Post after his elimination, councillor Butler, who topped the polls in Limerick City West in the local election over the weekend, said that he “was in it to win it”.
“We come into elections to win them, and I was in it to win it. I suppose we had a lot against us. We came in very, very late,” Cllr Butler said.
“We came in in the middle of a change in leadership in the party. We came in with another candidate pulled out of the same pocket. My director of elections lost his mother during this, our house was threatened, our safety, our family was threatened and compromised during the election. But we fought on, and I think we fought a very good campaign, and I think the vote that I got is reflective of the energy and innovation that I bought the campaign,” he said.
Cllr Butler said he was “very proud” of all his team achieved during the campaign, saying that “I think we bought a very high calibre campaign and delivered a lot in a short space of time. And I think I track, we attracted a voter that perhaps Fine Gael wouldn’t traditionally have attracted”.
Independent candidate John Moran is still leading the race with 22,290 votes, followed by fellow Independent candidate Helen O’Donnell on 16,688, and Fianna Fáil’s Dee Ryan on 15,473.
