IFA President Francie Gorman issued a statement today making clear that while former presidents are entitled to their personal views, their endorsements do not reflect the position of the organisation.<\/p>\n
\u201cFormer IFA Presidents are private citizens and can choose to run in elections or endorse any candidate they see fit,\u201d Gorman said. \u201cHowever, they do not speak for IFA and IFA does not support any candidate in this election or any other election.\u201d<\/p>\n
He emphasised that the association remains strictly non-political, as set out in its constitution. \u201cIFA is a strictly non-political organisation,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Gorman also called on farm families to exercise their democratic right on polling day, urging them to vote for the candidate of their choice. \u201cI do not believe that any purpose is served by spoiling your vote or voting for someone who has withdrawn from the election,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
Yesterday\u2019s advertisement in the Farming Independent had seen former IFA presidents \u2013 including Donie Cashman, Tom Clinton, John Donnelly, Tom Parlon, John Dillon, John Bryan, Eddie Downey, Joe Healy, and Tim Cullinan \u2013 sign a letter endorsing Heather Humphreys. The letter praised her experience and her ability to champion agriculture and rural life, asking farmers to vote for her in the election.<\/p>\n
While former leaders are free to take public positions, IFA\u2019s statement serves to remind members that the organisation itself does not take sides in political contests.<\/p>\n
The clarification comes as the campaign enters its final days, with polls showing Heather Humphreys trailing Independent candidate Catherine Connolly. Recent figures put Humphreys on 20%, well behind Connolly on 38%, leaving little room for momentum shifts before Friday\u2019s polling.<\/p>\n
The race also followed last night\u2019s Prime Time debate, the seventh and final of the campaign. Connolly is widely seen to have avoided missteps, while Humphreys struggled to press her opponent on issues ranging from her 2018 Syria trip to her work as a barrister during the financial crash.<\/p>\n
It comes after a significant rural push by the Humphreys camp over the weekend, pitching her as the candidate who \u201cunderstands rural life\u201d and warning supporters that staying at home could hand Connolly the presidency. Connolly, however, has also emphasised farming issues during her campaign.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"IFA President Francie Gorman issued a statement today making clear that while former presidents are entitled to their…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":98936,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[37550,61,60,43],"class_list":{"0":"post-98935","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ireland","8":"tag-ciaran-moran","9":"tag-ie","10":"tag-ireland","11":"tag-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98935","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=98935"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98935\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/98936"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=98935"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=98935"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=98935"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}