Given that Presidential campaigns are more about personalities destroying them than about political parties, the celebrity endorsement has been a feature of elections since 1990.

As the campaign continues we can expect to see (sort of) famous people arrive to speak at meetings for candidates or release statements.  Not all at once mind but more on a drip drip basis which indicates a build up of momentum.

So today on Campaign Diary some early shots in the I’m a Celebrity and this is who you should vote for President Jungle.

Mary Davis has Niall Quinn, former Irish Soccer International,out of the blocks first from what must be quite a list of contacts from that event in 2003. Niall has even got a video recorded to back up his endorsement, (somewhere very noisy).

I’m not sure if Denis O’Brien has recorded an endorsement for her yet.

Michael D has had a few endorsements, he has many artists selling paintings and performing at gigs and fundraisers for him including Mary Coughlan.

No sign of Gay Mitchell, David Norris or Sean Gallagher fans yet (where are the other Dragons?) or Dana for that matter (though Kathy Sinnott the former MEP is out and about with her in Munster looking for votes.)

The person who is attracting the largest number of endorsements at the moment appears to be Martin McGuinness. Now it’s important to note that the quality or should that be star rating of the celeb varies wildly.

Exhibit A
Roddy Collins, League of Ireland Football Manager

Exhibit B
Colm Meaney – Actor

Fionnula Flanagan, Frances Black, Peter Sheridan, and former Ulster GAA star Peter Canavan have all turned up too to back McGuinness.

I’ll keep an eye out for more star sightings as the campaign progresses, of course please let me know if you see anything? It’ll be our very own #Aras11 Hello magazine!