{"id":487113,"date":"2026-05-16T03:46:13","date_gmt":"2026-05-16T03:46:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/487113\/"},"modified":"2026-05-16T03:46:13","modified_gmt":"2026-05-16T03:46:13","slug":"fianna-fail-will-not-seek-to-stop-ahern-from-canvassing-despite-immigration-remarks-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/487113\/","title":{"rendered":"Fianna F\u00e1il will not seek to stop Ahern from canvassing despite immigration remarks \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Fianna F\u00e1il<\/a> will not seek to stop Bertie Ahern<\/a> from canvassing in advance of the Dublin Central byelection<\/a> despite his remarks on immigration<\/a>, Taoiseach Miche\u00e1l Martin<\/a> has confirmed.<\/p>\n

The controversy comes as Fianna F\u00e1il gathers in Dublin<\/a> for its 84th ardfheis being held on the centenary of the party being founded in 1926.<\/p>\n

Former taoiseach Ahern has been widely criticised for his comments and Martin and other senior Fianna F\u00e1il figures like Minister for Public Expenditure Jack Chambers<\/a> have distanced themselves<\/a> from his remarks. <\/p>\n

Footage surfaced of Ahern speaking to a woman about immigration during a byelection canvass for Dublin Central last week.<\/p>\n

During the video, which was made without Ahern\u2019s knowledge, the woman raised concerns about immigration and sharia law, with the former taoiseach saying he believed there were too many migrants coming into the country.<\/p>\n

He said the \u201cones I worry about are the Africans\u201d, adding \u201cwe can\u2019t be taking in people from the Congo and all these places. I think there\u2019s too many from those places.\u201d<\/p>\n

[\u00a0\u2018I\u2019ve no problem with people from the Congo or Africa\u2019: Bertie Ahern addresses video commentsOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

He also said he was concerned about second-generation Muslims born to people who came into the country.<\/p>\n

Ahern said on Wednesday he had \u201cno problem\u201d with people from Africa or \u201cthe Congo\u201d but that he felt the immigration system should move more quickly. <\/p>\n

During an interview on Indo Daily podcast Ahern published on Friday he said: \u201cI reject racism in all its forms. This is not who I am and it\u2019s not what I stand for.\u201d<\/p>\n

He added: \u201cMy comments were never intended to target or demean any group of people and in particular I should not have singled out any one nationality or group of people. That was wrong\u201d.<\/p>\n

Ahern also confirmed that he intends to go out canvassing in the final week of the byelection campaign. <\/p>\n

Speaking to reporters in advance of the ardfheis, Martin said Ahern\u2019s comments in the video \u201cdon\u2019t represent the views of the party\u201d.<\/p>\n

He said: \u201cwe\u2019re not stopping people from canvassing, but we are making it very clear to all our canvassers what the party position is and what is permissible and what is not.\u201d<\/p>\n

Martin also said: \u201cwe can\u2019t physically stop people from canvassing\u201d.<\/p>\n

Fianna F\u00e1il appears to be struggling to make an impact in the byelection campaigns in Dublin Central and Galway West<\/a>. Opinion polls carried out for The Irish Times and TG4 by Ipsos B&A showed the party\u2019s candidates in both constituencies trailing rivals. <\/p>\n

The Dublin Central poll published on Thursday has Fianna F\u00e1il\u2019s candidate Cllr John Stephens on 4 per cent.<\/p>\n

Cllr Cillian Keane, the party\u2019s Galway West candidate was on 8 per cent in a poll published last week. <\/p>\n

Martin responded to the figures saying: \u201cpolls are not elections\u201d.<\/p>\n

He said: \u201cWe\u2019re out there competing. We\u2019re knocking on the doors. We\u2019re getting a warm reception and a positive reception.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve been on the doors myself and I must say I have received a very positive engagement with people both in Galway and indeed in Dublin Central.\u201d<\/p>\n

He brushed aside a question on whether he expected more questions from within Fianna F\u00e1il about his future as leader of the party should the opinion poll results be reflected in the actual results after election day on May 22nd.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you go back over previous byelections, I think you\u2019ll see similar results, similar outcomes to those polls. I don\u2019t anticipate that on this occasion,\u201d Martin said. <\/p>\n

\u201cEach constituency is different\u201d and \u201cthere are certain issues in terms of the strength of the party in different situations.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Fianna F\u00e1il will not seek to stop Bertie Ahern from canvassing in advance of the Dublin Central byelection…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":487114,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[40],"tags":[15526,9,10,52,106968,18,13,14,4771,167920,6,19,56,17,26736,11,12,15,16,5765,5,7,8],"class_list":["post-487113","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-bertie-ahern","tag-breaking-news","tag-breakingnews","tag-dublin","tag-dublin-central-constituency","tag-eire","tag-featured-news","tag-featurednews","tag-fianna-fail","tag-galway-west-constituency","tag-headlines","tag-ie","tag-immigration","tag-ireland","tag-jack-chambers","tag-latest-news","tag-latestnews","tag-main-news","tag-mainnews","tag-micheal-martin","tag-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topstories"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/487113","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=487113"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/487113\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/487114"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=487113"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=487113"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=487113"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}