9/1 The Front Pages

“’Stay away Cowen’ say FF as Ned joins rebels” is the curious headline across the front of the Sunday Independent. It relates to the fact that many Fianna Fail candidates in the forthcoming general election plan to tell an Taoiseach to keep his distance when the go on the campaign trail.

The Ned in question is Fianna Fail TD Ned O’Keefe – until now seen as loyal to Cowen, but not anymore. He’d previously called for the head of Minister for Finance Brian Lenihan, but has shifted attention onto the man in charge.

He’s now calling for Cowen to resign – a move seen by his critics as his way of keeping the leadership of his party at arms length. Either that or he’s decided that he really doesn’t like the name Brian.

The Sunday Indo also points out that yesterday saw the twelfth sitting FF TD say that they wouldn’t be contesting the next general election.

Mary Wallace is the latest to decide that it’s much nicer to draw on a nice pension rather than face the inevitable abuse that is bound to come the way of any government representative  who dares to go door to door in the months to come.

The Sunday Tribune focuses its wrath on Mary Harney who has been holidaying at a five-star hotel in Thailand and who issued statements from there regarding VHI fee hikes, patients in hospitals being left on trolleys and the fact that more than 5,000 have been diagnosed with swine flu.

The Tribune also reports that “Gardaí investigate ‘anthrax’ attack on ministers and Ahern”. Seven ministers and Bertie were targeted before Christmas and sent envelopes containing a white flake-like substance as part of a hoax attack.