EIRE: Dev Up

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Placing the stamp of approval on his recently negotiated Anglo-Irish agreement, the voters of Eire in a general election for the Dail Eireann (lower house) last week returned lanky, professorial Prime Minister Eamon de Valera and his government to power for five more years. At last reports "Dev's" Fianna Fail party had captured 70 of the 138 seats, the Fine Gael party of his oldtime opponent, former President William T. Cosgrave, 40 seats, the Labor party six and the Independents seven. Under Eire's involved system of proportional representation, the final tabulation will be a matter of days but observers held that of the 15 unconfirmed seats, five would go to the Government, the same number to the Cosgrave group, and the remaining four to Labor.

Thus, for the first time since he came to power seven years ago, "Dev" would have a fairly comfortable majority, 75 seats against a total of 63 if all the other parties combined against him. Elected at first with a precarious majority, for the last five years his government has had to depend on Labor support to hold office. Month ago, his own political stock soaring as a result of the Anglo-Irish treaty, "Dev" shrewdly seized upon a minor government rebuff as an excuse to dissolve Parliament and go to the country.

Most surprising upset of the election was the showing of Dublin's Lord Mayor, Alfred Byrne, Fine Gael Party member. For 20 years dapper, little "Alf" has ruled the Dublin roost. Last week, his total poll barely gave him the third seat under proportional representation in Dublin's Northeast district as "Dev's" Minister for Posts & Telegraphs, Oscar Traynor, took the first, a Cosgravite the second.