A small sample of local opinion in Dingle, Co Kerry, has shown overwhelming opposition to the decision by Minister for the Gaeltacht Éamon Ó Cuív to rename it on road signs as An Daingean.
An overwhelming majority of respondents rejected the change in a survey carried out by Fine Gael on Saturday.
The sample was of 98 voters out of an electoral register of 1,878.
The issue is gaining political overtones in the Kerry South constituency and there is likely to be renewed pressure on Minister of Tourism and local Fianna Fáil TD John O'Donoghue to persuade Mr Ó Cuív to reverse his decision. Mr Ó Cuív has emphatically ruled this out.
The matter will be raised in the Seanad in the autumn when Senators Paul Coghlan and Joe O'Toole attempt to have the Official Languages Act amended so that both names can go on the road signs.
Kerry county councillors have been urged by Mr Coghlan and Mr O'Toole to hold an official plebiscite on the issue under the Local Authority Act.
Yesterday, Fine Gael vice-president and solicitor Gerry O'Connell said the Local Government Act had a provision allowing for the consent of the majority of electors of any non-municipal town where it was proposed to change the town's placename.
Fine Gael's youth officer in Kerry South Brendan Griffin claimed the entire saga "smacked of sheer Government arrogance and changing the name of Dingle to An Daingean will not only jeopardise the local tourist trade but will also cause resentment of the language".
