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Ireland's new leader, Fine Gael's Enda Kenny, has said the country is on "brink of fundamental change"
Ireland's main opposition leader Enda Kenny has said his Fine Gael party has won a "massive endorsement" to govern after parliamentary elections.
Votes are still being counted but Fine Gael is expected to be the largest party in the Republic's parliament, without having an overall majority.
The dominant party for generations, Fianna Fail, faces a crushing defeat.
Mr Kenny said he would now work on renegotiating the previous government's 85bn-euro (£72bn) EU/IMF loan package.
The Irish Republic is the first EU member state to have received a financial bail-out to go to the polls. Mr Kenny said the "exceptional mandate" he had secured would enable him to put his case to other EU countries for changing the terms of the loan.
"I look for co-operation and support across Europe," he told Irish national broadcaster RTE, adding that he intended to make an immediate start on revisiting the terms of the bail-out in the coming week. Mr Kenny is particularly keen to reduce the 5.8% interest rate imposed on EU loans.
He said European leaders knew of the difficulties that the Irish people had with the loan package and he saw "room to manoeuvre" over the interest rate. He aimed first to speak to the European People's Party grouping of centre-right parties in Helsinki on 4 March before tackling the issue at an EU summit in Brussels a week later.
Analysis
A seismic change has taken place in Irish party politics.
Fianna Fail was the dominant political force in Ireland for 80 years, but has been left humbled and humiliated.
Fine Gael has historically been the bridesmaid of Irish politics, but will now take the lead role.
A lot will be said in the coming days about a fresh start for Ireland and a new beginning.
However, given the dire state of the country's public finances, the new government will have no option but to continue with austerity measures.
The extent of his election success was emphasised by the 17,472 first preference votes he received in his Mayo constituency in the west of Ireland. It was the highest number of first preference votes for any candidate under the Irish system of proportional representation.
RTE said Mr Kenny was now certain to be elected taoiseach (prime minister) when the Dail met on 9 March.
Outgoing Taoiseach Brian Cowen congratulated Mr Kenny, describing the opposition's vote as "outstanding".
Voters blamed Fianna Fail for the end of the "Celtic Tiger" economic boom. The party is on course to lose more than 50 of the 78 seats it secured in the 2007 election. Former junior coalition partner, the Greens, also fared badly.
Micheal Martin, who has replaced Mr Cowen as Fianna Fail leader, also congratulated Mr Kenny and said he expected Fianna Fail to fall short of the 24 seats he had hoped for.
"I was under no illusion that there was an enormous challenge ahead of us," he said. "I'm eager now to lead the party through a period of renewal and restore the trust with the Irish people."
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Fianna Fail have paid the political price for the EU/IMF bail-out
Fine Gael is hoping to secure a majority in the 166-seat Dail but with an estimated 36% of first-preference votes, the party is expected to fall short of the required 83 seats.
A coalition with the Labour party, tipped for second place, is most likely although Fine Gael might also seek a deal with independent members of the parliament.
The party's director of elections, Phil Hogan, said he was optimistic of winning between 78 and 82 seats but Mr Kenny preferred to wait for the final result.
However he said that once the final outcome was clear he would form a government as quickly as he could so as not to send the "wrong signals" to other European governments.
When asked whether there were major differences between his party and Labour, Mr Kenny responded: "The people deserve a strong government and there's not an hour to be lost."
'Wipe-out' in DublinBBC Ireland correspondent Mark Simpson says Fianna Fail is facing almost complete wipe-out in Dublin. Its share of the vote in the capital city is estimated to be just 8%, and analysts say the party will struggle to win more than one of Dublin's seats.
Former Finance Minister Brian Lenihan has been elected but he is likely to be Fianna Fail's sole survivor in the city. His brother, former junior minister Conor Lenihan, lost his seat.
Noel Dempsey, a former Fianna Fail minister retiring from politics, said a nationwide total of 20-plus seats was all the party could hope for.
"It's looking pretty grim," he said. Another spokesman said the party had struggled in every constituency.
Irish politics
- Dominated by two parties, Fianna Fail and Fine Gael, which emerged after Irish nationalists split over the 1921 Anglo-Irish Treaty
- Fianna Fail was once seen as more centrist, Fine Gael as more conservative, but differences have blurred
- The Labour Party was the traditional junior partner in coalitions until 1997
- The Green Party came into its own in 2007 when it joined Fianna Fail in coalition
- Sinn Fein, shunned by the mainstream because of its IRA connections, held nearly as many seats as the Greens in the outgoing parliament
Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams, who gave up his seat in the UK parliament to stand in the election and stepped down from the Northern Ireland Assembly, topped the poll in Louth, in the north-east, with more than 15,000 votes.
Sinn Fein is aiming at least to double its representation in the Irish parliament.
Mr Adams said it was on course for major gains: "I think the votes across the state show a significant amount of people support the position we have taken up."
According to the RTE exit poll, throughout the country Fine Gael won 36.1% and Labour, its traditional coalition partner, took 20.5% - its best result ever. Fianna Fail was knocked into third place on 15.1%, its worst ever result.
Sinn Fein won 10.1% while support for the Greens, Fianna Fail's junior coalition partner, plummeted to 2.7%. Other candidates, in a race with a record number of independents standing, took 15.5%.
It will take two days to complete the official count.
Many parts of the country saw a big increase in turnout on the 67% recorded in the last general election in 2007.
Without a separation of bank and sovereign debt we are sunk. No matter who sits in the parliament, with no removal of the private bank debt from the Irish taxpayer the country will default. The sharks will swoop in and buy up everything (property/state assets/bank assets), we descend into servitude. History repeating itself, will people ever learn?
It is a complete farce, it doesn't really matter which party wins the election. The real power lies with the IMF, they essentially 'own' Ireland now. Fine Gael will just be the puppets of the EU bailiffs. Sad times indeed for once such a proud country.
As an Irish Citizen who works in the Republic and lives in the North (British controlled zone) I have taken quite a bit of interest in this election and looked back into the history to see how these parties formed. Whilst Fianna Fail can be partly blamed for the lack of banking regulation, trying to remain on the pigs back and for years ignored the EU with regard to economic overheating and unsustainable growth, they are not entirely at fault. Citizens must share some of the responsibility for this. They were happy to take the ridiculous loans and accepted the lunatic property valuations. The three main political parties don't seem to have a clear ethos or identifiable set of beliefs and remarkable the only party that did expose their thinking was Sinn Fein. It was clear that in the republic they position themselves to the left and have made it clear that they will follow a largely socialist approach. This would be a massive departure from their stance in the north, which is largely neo-conservative. For Ireland to succeed, she needs to understand who she is and what she represents. They need to decide which system of government is best for the country. They need to decide if they want to serve the people or the banks and captains of industry. Its regrettable that a right winged party, Fine Gael, holds the upper hand and they are clearing now and historically a party who do not know if they are Irish or best suckling the teat of British colonialism. Hopefully Labour will find themselves, understand their roots and if in coalition will steer the country towards more non-offensive policies. Ireland needs to realise that its not a US state. It may have senators, a president and have 26 of its counties in a republic and a health system that checks your wallet before your pulse...hold on....maybe it needs to become the 51st state afterall :-)
Fianna Fail's defeat is like the aftermath of an earthquake except in an earthquake there are only innocent victims. The last twelve months we have listened to one lie after another and the Irish people have finally woken up to the fact that when people in particular politicians lie they must be punished. It is such a shame that some of the party's members were allowed to resign before the election and receive such huge sums of money as a reward for their lies and deceit.
Doesn't matter who gets the ministerial car - Jean Claude Trichet is the commander in chief. We are just an EU fiefdom and this stage, here to pay the gambling debts of French, German and UK banks.
Wholly deserved.
There was only one person I talked to on my recent trip home who admitted she was going to vote for Fianna Fail, she said: "I know they are awful, but I can't bring myself to vote for anyone else." This is the attitude of someone who supports a football team and sticks by them no matter what to do and cannot vote for a rival. It would be like a Manchester United supporter being dissatisfied with their team and supporting Liverpool instead - they simply cannot bring themselves to do it. Fianna Fail understands this mentality as is shown by a frequent slogan of theirs: "Vote for the winning team." Only when people realise that politics needs to be taken more seriously than sport can this mentality be changed.
Fianna Fail went on the "payroll" of the financial services sector and promoted and magnified the worst excess of financial practices that let to Ireland's sever recession. Then Fianna Fail compounded the problem by lying to everyone about the real state if the Irish Government's finances, leaving Ireland exposed to the harsh terms of the EU bailout that will haunt Ireland for years to come. Fianna Fail's electoral disaster is well earned.
The people are angry so they hit out at the ruling party, however the winner in this election like Obama over here will be accepting a poisoned chalice. Any fool can govern when things are good, the only answer for Mother Eire is to default and let the financial sector clean up its own mess.
Whoever wins, it won't change the size of the debt.
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