Former Dublin GAA manager Jim Gavin as Fianna Fáil’s presidential candidate? The pros and cons

Jim Gavin belongs to a small group of Dublin GAA football players who have won an All Ireland championship as both a player and a manager.

Now his name is linked to a very different kind of national contest: the presidency of Ireland, as a possible candidate for Government party Fianna Fáil.

Gavin lined out as half forward on the team that won the Sam Maguire by defeating Tyrone in 1995.

He played underage football with Dublin all the way up and was an accomplished player but he did not have the stellar reputation of the big stars such as Charlie Redmond and Jason Sherlock.

Gavin was more of a worker bee, a team player.

Speaking about it almost a quarter of a century later to the GAA’s website, the 1995 manager Dr Pat O’Neill said that Gavin’s philosophy was tilted to the collective rather than the individual.

“He was certainly very disciplined and functioned as part of a team and I think you can still see that,” he said.

“It’s very much a team effort, he doesn’t promote individuals in any form or fashion.”

As Fianna Fáil runs the rule over potential candidates in the race for Áras an Uachtaráin, the party will be considering the pros and cons of picking a candidate such as Gavin and whether his popularity will transfer from sport to politics.

[ Bertie Ahern not among Fianna Fáil favourites for presidential runOpens in new window ]

The pros

Gavin’s reputation in the GAA is not based so much on his time as a player but his hugely successful stint as Dublin senior football manager when he brought back six All-Ireland titles to the capital.

In tandem with that, he has been a senior figure in the public service for most of his working career.

He trained as an officer and a pilot in the Air Corps, was involved in overseas peacekeeping and continued his career in the Defence Forces as the chief flying instructor and chief of military aviation in the Air Corps.

He also trained as a commercial jet pilot and has spent his post-Defence Forces career as an aviation regulator.

He is currently chief operations officer of the Irish Aviation Authority, which gives operational responsibility for air safety in Ireland.

In 2022, he chaired a Citizens’ Assembly examining the case for a directly elected mayor for Dublin. He has also chaired, since 2023, a taskforce seeking to improve services, facilities and the quality of live in Dublin’s northeast inner city, which has suffered significant disadvantage over many decades.

Within the GAA, his reputation has been burnished in the past year by his chairmanship of the GAA’s football rule committee, which has revolutionised the playing rules of Gaelic football. Gavin assembled the most highly rated former players and managers in the country and has introduced radical rule changes that have transformed the game at inter-county level.

'Presidential campaigns can be truly brutal,' says one former senior adviser to the party. Photograph: INPHO/ Bryan Keane

Similar to his approach in other areas, the project has been characterised by a high level of organisation and planning, extensive consultation, research, real-life trialling, feedback and a willingness to adapt when a reform has not been wholly successful.

In public, Gavin has a low-key and understated persona, but it belies what friends say is a genuine passion for the State and for its values. His career and his other activities manifest those values, he says.

The cons

If Gavin were to be elected President, he would be the first since Douglas Hyde to have no background in politics.

While Mary Robinson and Mary McAleese were not active in politics when selected to run, both had been involved with political parties.

While he will have a strong support base within the large and national GAA community, he will be largely unknown to many who don’t follow sport.

Columnist Gerry Howlin, a former senior adviser to Fianna Fáil governments, does not follow sport and admits he “had to Google” Gavin to find out more about him.

He said that Gavin ticks many of the boxes in terms of leadership and public service, as well as having an exemplary character.

[ What’s going on with Fianna Fáil’s presidential election plan to pick a nominee?Opens in new window ]

“So the question is: when he goes live, can he synthesise? I don’t know the answer to that question. So he has a lot of ingredients, which, if they were synthesised, could sizzle.

“If they’re not synthesised, he’ll be at the poor man’s Heather Humphreys,” he said, referring to the former Fine Gael minister and the party’s front-runner to become its presidential candidate.

He says Gavin would be an unknown quantity in a campaign that will last eight weeks, which is well over twice the length of a general election campaign and in which the individual is subject to far more scrutiny.

Another former senior adviser to the party Derek Mooney shares similar observations, saying Gavin’s professional and GAA career are big advantages.

“The biggest con is that he has never fought an election. Presidential campaigns can be truly brutal, especially for those from outside the political sphere,” he said.

“He also lacks any international dimension, and the Robinson, McAleese and Higgins’ presidencies have highlighted the importance of this.”

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