Chris Andrews during the 2011 General Election

If it didn’t fall into its lap, you could say it is a master stroke by Sinn Fein. In one fell swoop, it gives the party a strong possibility of a south Dublin seat, as well as creating a serious threat in this constituency to Kevin Humphreys, the second Labour TD – and, most satisfyingly for SF, it also puts a serious block in the way of a Fianna Fail seat there for barrister Jim O’Callaghan (Miriam’s brother).

Even as it is, Andrews’s ‘defection’ is emblematic of a wider political shift, which is the further welcome removal of SF from its IRA-associated past and the arrival into the party of credible, street-savvy and mainstream figures like Andrews.
…Andrew’s FF expulsion didn’t faze him. He was already disillusioned by the system and once told me, revealingly, that the problem was that people did not want real political change – “They only want to change the gatekeepers.”

Andrews’s defection a harbinger of political change (Eamon Delaney, Irish Independent)

Sinn Fein confirms former Fianna Fail TD Chris Andrews has joined party (Jason Kennedy, Irish Times)

Previously: Regime Change