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DUBLIN — The path quickly cleared Thursday for Finance Minister Brian Cowen to become Ireland's next premier after the entire Cabinet backed him to replace Bertie Ahern.
Cowen, 48, who is also deputy prime minister, was poised to be the only candidate after nominations close Saturday for the next leader of Fianna Fail, Ireland's perennial No. 1 party.
Fianna Fail chief whip Tom Kitt said the party's 77 lawmakers eligible to vote would crown their new party leader Wednesday morning. The leader then would formally replace Ahern when parliament elects a new prime minister May 7, the day after Ahern's resignation takes effect.
Ahern's three-party coalition has a nine-seat majority in the 166-member parliament, the Dail. Unless the coalition breaks down, his successor will not be obliged to call another election until mid-2012.
Cowen has been a loyal Ahern lieutenant for 11 years. He has been known as "the anointed one" ever since Ahern declared him his preferred successor 10 months ago.
Cowen's lock on the top job became apparent as, one by one, more than a dozen Cabinet colleagues declared they would not challenge him.
Backers cited Cowen's exceptionally broad experience as minister atop six government departments since 1992. They credited him as a no-nonsense, straight-talking leader with no interest in pursuing Ahern's populist style.
On Wednesday, Ahern shocked Ireland by announcing plans to step down as premier and party leader. His move followed an 18-month investigation into his 1990s finances that has exposed him as the recipient of large amounts of poorly documented cash, some of which he admits came from business friends. He denies any of the money amounted to bribes.
Ahern spent his first day as a lame-duck premier delivering a speech to a University College Dublin conference marking the 10th anniversary of the Good Friday peace accord for Northern Ireland, a landmark pact that Ahern was instrumental in achieving on April 10, 1998.
Foreign Minister Dermot Ahern, who is no relation to the prime minister, said it troubled the premier that friends, colleagues and his former girlfriend all had endured difficult testimony on his behalf during the investigation of his finances by a government-named tribunal.
"Being the decent man that he is, it really rankled him that his friends had to go into the bear pit of the tribunal — because of him," Dermot Ahern said.
