Fox Elected as Marathon Election Count Ends

Sitting Deputy Mildred Fox won the last seat in the general election for the 29th Dáil late last Saturday evening when she

Mildred Fox and Jubilant Supporters

beat nearest rival from the Labour party, Nicky Kelly by just 19 votes in a nail-biting finish.

The re-check that has been taking place since last Thursday started to reach a conclusion on Saturday afternoon and the first new figures for the first and seconds counts were announced at 6 p.m.

The positions of the first four candidates elected, Dick Roche, Liz McManus, Billy Timmins and Joe Jacob changed very little. However, tension entered the arena when it emerged that Nicky Kelly had bridged the gap of 47 that existed after the initial

Nicky Kelly: Magnanimous in defeat

count last week.

It all came down to the distribution of Joe Jacob's surplus of 156 votes but Mildred Fox picked up 19 of those while Nicky Kelly got 12 giving Mildred the last seat. It is likely that this count was the last manual count and that future counts will be electronic, making recounts a thing of the past.

Magnanimous in defeat, Nicky Kelly paid tribute to everyone involved in the campaign and the staff for giving the count so much attention to detail in the past few days.

And vowed that the labout party would win a second seat in Wicklow in the next election when, he said, "someone else will be

Candidates wait their turn to speak

up here fulfilling the role of defeated candidate".

There has been speculation that Dick Roche and even Mildred Fox may be in line for a ministerial position in the new government. However this will depend on negotiations between Fianna Fáil and the Progressive Democrats over the next few days.