By Padraic Halpin and Conor Humphries
DUBLIN (Reuters) – Ireland’s two big centre-right parties looked set to return to power after Friday’s election but will likely need at least one junior partner to reach a majority, raising questions about the stability of the next government. .
The sides may face protracted negotiations or an unstable coalition before the inauguration of US President-elect Donald Trump, whose promise to cut corporate taxes and impose tariffs poses a major threat to the Irish economy.
The outgoing government parties, Fine Gael and Fianna Fail, polled 21% and 19.5% respectively in an exit poll, slightly behind left-wing Sinn Fein on 21.1%.
With the two centre-right parties ruling out a deal with Sinn Féin, the main question was how close to the 88 seats needed for a majority they can secure the pair, and whether they would need one or two more coalition parties to get over the line. .
“If they both have 20%, I suspect that will bring them closer to 80 seats, and then it will be a question of who will go with them,” said Gary Murphy, a politics professor at Dublin City University.
To have a stable government, they will hope that the small center-left parties and potentially willing partners, Labor or the Social Democrats, will win 11 or 12 seats, Murphy said. A coalition with four parties could be much more fragile.
The current minor coalition party, the Greens, garnered support from just 4%, down from 7% in the last election. This could see its number of seats fall from 12 to three, said senior party member Ciaran Cuffe.
The formal vote count began at 0900 GMT and is expected to last until Sunday at the earliest in many constituencies under Ireland’s proportional representation system known as the single transferable vote.
That system is likely to give the largest parties a larger share of seats than their share of the vote, but a rough seat count may not emerge until Sunday.
DRAW BUDGET
Prime Minister Simon Harris called the election on the heels of a €10.5 billion ($11 billion) free budget that began putting money in voters’ pockets during the campaign, a largesse made possible by billions of euros of corporate tax revenues of foreign multinationals.
However, a gaffe-filled campaign for her Fine Gael party, which culminated last weekend with a viral clip of Harris walking away from an exasperated healthcare worker, cost them their pre-election lead.
Government parties also faced widespread frustration during the campaign over their inability to turn Europe’s healthiest public finances into better public services.
Sinn Fein, the former political wing of the Irish Republican Army, looked set to lead the next government a year ago but suffered a 30-35% drop in support, partly due to anger among its working-class base over the relatively liberal immigration. policies.
Fine Gael and Fianna Fail, former rivals who have led every government since the state’s founding almost a century ago, agreed to share the role of prime minister during the last government, swapping roles midway through the five-year term. This time it seems likely that a similar agreement will be reached.