Ireland headed for coalition government as election exit poll shows three-way split

The official exit poll in Ireland's parliamentary elections suggests the three biggest parties have won roughly equal shares of the vote and the country is headed for another coalition government.

The Ipsos B&A poll released as voting ended at 23CET showed the centre-right party Fine Gael was leading with 21% of the vote, with its centre-right coalition partner in the outgoing government, Fianna Fáil polling at 19.5%.

Coming in third is the left-of-centre Sinn Féin at 21.1%.

Counting of ballots starts on Saturday morning and because Ireland uses a complex system of proportional representation known as the single transferrable vote, it can take between several hours and several days for full results to be known.

The result will show whether Ireland bucks the global trend of incumbent governments being ousted by disgruntled voters after years of pandemic, international instability and a cost-of-living pressures.

Sinn Féin, which had urged people to vote for change, hailed the result.

"There is every chance that Sinn Féin will emerge from these elections as the largest political party," Sinn Féin director of elections Matt Carthy told public broadcaster RTÉ.

Though Sinn Féin, which aims to reunite Northern Ireland with the independent Republic of Ireland, could become the largest party in the 174-seat Dáil, the lower house of parliament, it may struggle to get enough coalition partners to form a government.

Both Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil have refused to form alliances with it.

The outgoing government was led by the two parties who have dominated Irish politics for the past century: Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil.

They have similar centre-right policies but are long-time rivals with origins on opposing sides of Ireland’s 1920s civil war.

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