Yesterday evening saw Galway dairy farmer Joe Healy elected as the 15th President of the IFA, following weeks of election debates and campaigning.

Healy was elected on the first count after he secured 14,122 first preference votes which gave him 50% of the vote.

Following the result, the two other candidates in the race Henry Burns and Flor McCarthy said that it’s important everyone in IFA rows in behind Joe and that he had their support.

The Twitter hash-tag #IFAElection began trending early in the day as counting got underway in the Castleknock Hotel in Dublin.

IFA Election trending

The night before the count got underway, Joe Healy tweeted that he felt like it was the night before the Leaving Cert results.

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Healy took an early lead in the election and by 12.30 yesterday with 37% of the branches counted, Healy had 47% of the vote.

election update

Declan Varley, Group Editor of the Galway Advertiser, tweeted that if Healy wins there wouldn’t be a cow sheared in the west.

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dec varley

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Healy said that being elected President of the IFA was finally ‘an All-Ireland for Galway’.

After the result, Ronan Byrne posted this crafty tweet, that there was a spike in the price of straw bales west of the Shannon.

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r byrne

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Byrne also tweeted later in the evening, saying that there wouldn’t be a cow milked in Athenry for a [while].

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David Kerr, a dairy farmer from Co. Laois, tweeted that this looked to be the first IFA election where experience was no advantage at all.

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david kerr

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One Healy supporter wasn’t letting the Galway count area sign out of his hands!

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Joe Healy went home to Galway last night following his election and thanked everyone for their support.

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Finally, this image of a sign with ‘Aras an Uachtarain’ in front of Healy’s house was sent into us after he was elected.

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agriland healy tweet

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Meanwhile, Richard Kennedy was elected Deputy President of the IFA. Current IFA Poultry Chairman Nigel Renaghan was eliminated following the first count.

Kennedy finished up with 14,531 votes and the third candidate in the Deputy race Pat Farrell received 11,396 votes in the second count.

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In the race for Munster Chairman, John Coughlan was elected to the position after he received more votes than John O’Brien.

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