Council candidates face long wait for results

It will be days before nervous candidates know their fate, with votes in the Assembly election to be counted today and Saturday. The task of allocating local council seats will not begin until Monday.

The run-in to polling day was marked by an upsurge in violence by dissident republican groups opposed to the peace process. The extremists launched a series of attacks, culminating in the murder of police constable Ronan Kerr who was killed when a booby-trap bomb exploded underneath his car in Omagh, Co Tyrone last month.

Politicians and community leaders from across the religious divide united in the aftermath of the murder.

The 25-year-old policeman’s family urged voters to come out in strength and cast their ballots in support of peace.

Voter turnout has been in decline in Northern Ireland, with figures dropping as the peace process has developed.

The electoral office said turnout for Assembly elections in 1998 was 69.9 per cent, in 2003 it was 63.9 per cent and in 2007 it was 62.9 per cent.

The outgoing Stormont administration, led by the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) and Sinn Fein, was the first of its kind to last for a full term.

In the 2007 Assembly election the DUP took 36 seats, Sinn Fein 28, the Ulster Unionists 18, the SDLP 16 and Alliance seven.

During the Assembly election campaign the DUP and Sinn Fein put on a united front during televised leaders’ debates, trying to tap in to the public desire for stable government. But opponents said voters want better delivery from Stormont.