• Elections: Sinn Fein, from marginal force to new arbitrator of Irish politics
  • The portrait: Mary Lou McDonald, the heiress of Gerry Adams

Sinn Fein leader, Mary Lou McDonald, has proclaimed herself the winner of the general elections in Ireland with 24.5% of the popular vote and has offered to be part of a coalition government with Fine Gael or Fianna Fail, both center-right parties that for almost a century have alternately taken office in power.

"If they are democratic, they would have to talk to me and stop relegating Sinn Fein to the margins," said McDonald, architect of the metamorphosis of the political arm of the IRA in the majority and emblematic party of the new Ireland. "We have won the popular vote and people have chosen us to represent them . "

With half of the votes counted, Sinn Fein slightly surpassed his two rivals, although his decision to limit his number of candidates to 42 (out of 160 possible) will nevertheless prevent him from being the majority force in Parliament. The projections grant 36 deputies to the Republican party , the same as the Prime Minister Leo Varadkar, a Democrat Fine Gael, who has been third in discord with 20.9% of the popular vote and faces requests for resignation by the electoral fiasco.

The centrist party Fianna Fail, with 22.2% of the votes, would be in the end the second force but the one with the highest parliamentary representation, with 40 deputies. Its leader, Michael Martin, would start as an aspiring prime minister in a hypothetical government coalition. During the campaign, Martin ruled out the possibility of a coalition with Sinn Fein claiming his ideological differences with a party defined by himself as "socialist."

In the last hours, Martin has nevertheless left the door open with statements that have provoked protests within his own ranks. "I am a Democrat and I respect the people's decision , " he said hours after the elections that have caused the leftist turn of Irish politics.

Prime Minister Leo Varadkar also expressed his fear that Sinn Fein and Fianna Fail would end up "together in bed." Varadkar rejected a possible coalition with Sinn Fein claiming the "incompatibility" of the two parties and the historical ties of the Republicans with the IRA.

The elections were marked by social unrest in the face of the housing problem and the precariousness of public health, as well as the social progress of Ireland in the last four years (including referendums on gay marriages and abortion). 57% of the voters were on the other hand favorable to the celebration in five years of a referendum of unification of the two Irlandas, reactivated by Brexit.

From Northern Ireland, where Sinn Fein participates in a unity Government together with the Unionist Democratic Party (DUP), the results of the south were received with equal doses of hope and concern. "Sinn Fein is a hard left party with a less than transparent relationship with its violent past," said Steve Aiken, leader of the Ulster Unionist Party. "It's interesting what our neighbors are living, but sometimes also worrying."

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