As 240 polling stations opened throughout Mayo on Thursday morning, returning officer of the county, Fintan J Murphy, commented that voter turn out was “steady enough” since votes began being cast at 7am.
A total of 96,805 Mayo people had the right to cast their ballots in the presidential election and also to vote on two constitutional referendums, on reducing judicial pay and broadening the power of Oireachtas committees to hold inquiries.
Speaking to the Mayo Advertiser on Thursday morning, Mr Murphy said that so far information obtained from the urban areas of Ballina, Castlebar, and Westport showed a “steady enough” turn-out of voters, with people “trickling in”, however the returning officer said that peak time for voting would normally be around 7pm to 8.30pm that evening.
Mr Murphy said that voting turn out on the Mayo islands— Clare Island, Inishbiggle and Inishturk, which cast their votes on Tuesday — was high. In Clare Island 70 out of 115 people voted and there was a 60 to 65 per cent voter turn out on Inishturk. Mr Murphy said “we are very pleased” with such a high turnout, particularly as a lot of young people may not have been around to cast their vote.
In Castlebar, the Taoiseach Enda Kenny returned home from Brussels, where he had been attending Eurozone debt crisis talks, to cast his vote at St Patrick’s National School.
The polls closed on Thursday at 10pm and counting of the votes will start at 9am today (Friday ) at the TF, Castlebar, where up to 100 people will work at the centre.
According to Mr Murphy it is not possible to predict the presidential outcome from the local count centre as the county’s number one choice may not be reflected nationally. Results from Castlebar will be sent to the Central Count Centre at Dublin Castle, and Mr Murphy said that the “best estimate” for a national first court will be after 6pm. As for when it is expected that counting will finish, Mr Murphy said: “Speaking to the national returning officer she believes that it there will be a very good chance that the count will go into Saturday.”
Mr Murphy said that following the Presidential count that the counting of the referendums will take place. The retuning officer said that this will only take a couple of hours as it is a straight forward yes or no count.
By tomorrow, one of the seven candidates, who have all been embroiled in a controversial presidential campaign, will be officially announced as the ninth President of Ireland.
