After several months of wrangling, Connacht IFA is set to have a representative at National Council as voting gets underway in the region tonight for a new Chairman.

The race to elect a successor to Tom Turley has been fraught with controversy, with several nomination processes failing to reach a verdict.

Berry’s Hotel in Drumshambo, Co. Leitrim is the venue for the first vote in the region, where all members of the Leitrim County Executive are entitled to vote by secret ballot.

This includes county officers, representatives on national committees/ sections and on Executive Council, two Macra representatives and up to four delegates per branch, IFA has confirmed.

Two candidates are in the running for the position of IFA Connacht Chairman – Eddie Davitt from Sligo and Padraic Joyce from Mayo.

Davitt and Joyce, both former County Chairmen, were nominated to run for the position following a secret ballot vote by the region’s five County Chairmen in early May.

Connacht had been in deadlock for several months over the position of Regional Chairman as one candidate was nominated from each county for the top job meaning no county could endorse another to go forward for the position.

In order to appoint a representative for the region, each County Chairman voted to endorse one of the other candidates from outside their County Executive by voting 1, 2, 3 in a secret ballot.

The counting of votes will take place on Friday, June 24 and a venue has yet to be decided for the count.

The venues for the remainder of the counties in the region to vote are:

connacht elections