Winds of revolution in Ireland, according to the exit polls of yesterday's early elections. The sinister nationalist Sinn Fein, champion of reunification dreams with Ulster, also fueled by the possible repercussions of Brexit on the great British neighbor, is for the first time in the race for the goal of the first party of the Republic in a century: and, even if the absolute majority remains out of reach and cannot go to the government, it appears to be able to condition the country's future agenda.
The ballot started this morning and will end on Monday, but the exits broadcast by Rte public TV indicate a head to head on the last card. With the Sinn Fein of Mary Lou McDonald - the 50-year-old leader who took over from Gerry Adams and protagonist of the generational change that brought what was the political arm of the IRA guerrilla from the reference force of the republican trench in the Ulster only to a competitive party as well to Dublin - advancing to 22.3%. And the two pro-EU center-right parties who have always competed for power on the island, the late Gael of the outgoing premier Leo Varadkar (PPE), the youngest in Irish history, as well as the first declared gay and son of immigrant father, and Michael Fianna Fail (liberals), respectively at 22.4 and 22.2%.
Given the margin of error, it is a virtual parity that real results could fluctuate. While the allocation of seats remains to be decided according to a complicated proportional transferable system (with indication of the second and third preferences) destined in the end to leave room for a coalition between Fianna Fail and Fine Gael (which in the election campaign excluded agreements with the McDonald's party) or a government governed by the crutch of smaller groups such as the Greens and Labor.
But Sinn Fein (in Gaelic Noi Stessi), despite having presented only 42 candidates against the 80 seats necessary for the absolute majority, will still be the moral winner: that is, the response of a small part of the Irish is to the challenge of the Brexit, especially to social problems. A party whose rise breaks a taboo on the green island, that of the old ties with the dissolved Ira and the armed struggle during the bloody season of the 'troubles', more than 20 years after the Good Friday peace agreement. And it puts at least a radical platform on the confrontation table calling for a referendum on reunification within 5 years, problematic and at high risk of conflict, but less uncertain than in the past against the background of the potential effects on Northern Ireland of the United Kingdom's divorce from 'EU; as well as a left-left economic and civil rights program, inspired by the Spaniards of Podemos or Jeremy Corbyn on dossiers such as public spending, health care, public housing.