Roche road show keeps on the move

Sometimes you just can't get away from her. While Adi Roche and other presidential candidates say they have shaken off the Robinson Mk II label, the last occupant in the Park keeps reappearing.

It happened again yesterday, as Roche toured schools and resource centres in her native Tipperary. Inevitably, the first thing she sees on arrival is a plaque on the wall saying "Robinson was here", or words to that effect. The organisers of the centres eye her carefully, wondering whether this day might soon be worth a second plaque.

The meanderings of the Roche coach took in a resource centre and the head office of Muintir na Tire in Tipperary town, a centre for the disabled in Cashel and a new community school in Cahir.

Each place bore testament to the remarkable blossoming in community development and self help which has taken place throughout Ireland in recent years. It's a trend that has attracted relatively little attention in broader society, with the exception of the seemingly ubiquitous former president.

At the Nano Nagle Centre in Cashel they lined up to meet the candidate as though she were Queen Elizabeth at a royal variety performance.

It had been an early start for the Roche party, who left their hotel just before before the arrival of a travelling faith healer. The morning broke clear and crisp in the Glen of Aherlow, but distinctly unmiraculous.

There is little of the media hubbub that surrounds the candidates from the two main parties, lending the proceedings a relaxed atmosphere. Campaign manager Pat Magner keeps the show moving more or less on schedule, while local TD Michael Ferris does the introductions.

Each day of this campaign brings Adi Roche closer to her roots. The memories of Carnsore Point and peace demonstrations are flooding back with greater regularity than before. Yesterday she said it loud and clear: "I support the issues that make up the liberal agenda."

Victory for a conservative candidate would, according to her analysis, result in a "rolling back" of the gains made during the Robinson era. Guardian Adi is the only candidate who can protect this progress.

Roche's language has also hardened since she was accused of being "touchy feely". She said yesterday she was fed up being the "whipping boy" of cynical journalists. Fox hunting was "barbaric" and "uncivilised", she told a caller on RTE's Liveline.

But talk of love, spirit, vibrancy still abounds. The "man above" influenced everything she did, she told Marian Finucane. "What motivates me is my love of people . . . and I know, too, that it is in the power of that love that we can overcome the love of power."

Roche promised to donate at least half her pension to her proposed children's commission if elected.