Mayo 2024: Elections, challenges and changing tides

Exploring the political landscape in a pivotal year

by Caoimhín Rowland

As we step into 2024, Mayo finds itself at a crossroads of political intrigue with the upcoming local and European elections on June 7 promising a tantalising treat of democratic fervour.

For politicians, it's a path to power, evoking scenes of nail-biting tallies, count centre adulation, and fervent prayers to be the one hoisted above shoulders come nightfall.

For the electorate, it's a chance to voice their concerns.

Within the political sphere, Fianna Fáil grapples with an epic quandary - dissenting councillors, a globe-trotting leader, and the looming spectre of the immigration debate.

As councillors dissent over perceived domestic threats linked to immigration, the party's leadership navigates a delicate balance between international diplomacy and local concerns.

Party leader Micheál Martin, while rightly lauded as a diplomat abroad in 2023 as Minister for Foreign Affairs, will face his toughest challenge via internal relations this year.

County councillors, recently likened to an ICA guild by one former cathaoirleach, find themselves with diminished powers.

Yet their veto on the sale of public land remains a potent tool.

The stalling of significant projects begs the question: Do councillors truly lack the influence to enact change?

Locally, the Imperial Hotel, Military Barracks and old post office in Castlebar and Westport Convent all come under their ‘diminished’ remit.

A spotlight on tourism reveals Westport, once the jewel of Mayo, experiencing a decline in visitor numbers. Released figures showed that numbers on both Croagh Patrick and the greenway have slashed to half of what it was in 2019.

A worrying statistic for the Covies, particularly as rates rise for businesses and the cost of light, heat and staff rise.

I wonder, however, if we could find metrics on numbers to neighbouring Mulranny, Louisburgh and Newport from 2023?

Anecdotally those towns have seen an unprecedented boom in tourist figures.

Ballina, quite similarly, has gained through fantastic marketing, US Presidential visits and birthday celebrations. It has certainly and will in the future see numbers grow.

Belmullet, often overlooked on the Wild Atlantic Way, is now regularly thronged with traffic in the summer months, a rare but welcome sight for the barony, and with a state-of-the-art museum slated for Eachleim, more will follow suit.

Perhaps tourists have become bored of Westport, having seen it several times, and passed through family generations of trips to the west. People now groan at the sight of an invitation to yet another bloody stag do in Westport and the same old scenery.

Dynamics at play in this county are the most fascinating. 2024 will show how much of an influence the remote working returnees will have on the electoral make-up, via voting or running themselves.

Mayo, despite being mainly rural and agricultural, is poised to become the first county to achieve carbon zero, thanks in large part to our carbon-capturing bog lands and minimal heavy polluting industries.

That good news doesn’t hide the fact that politics is as polarised as ever here, and the immigration debate in particular creeps towards the nasty more than others.

But the underlying issues, such as the far-right using immigration to mask and deflect ire from issues such as housing and health, will be the key issues to dominate, as ever and seemingly always.