Voter turnout may decide the result of today's referendum on the Nice Treaty, the outcome of which will have repercussions throughout Europe.
With the Yes and No camps each predicting a narrow victory last night, a low turnout by one side or the other could swing the result. Both sides were yesterday predicting the turnout at around 40 per cent, and some feared it could be as low as 35 per cent. Some 2.9 million people are entitled to vote.
A Yes vote would facilitate a number of reforms of EU decision-making processes which the treaty's supporters say are necessary before new members join the Union.
Although the treaty must be ratified by all 15 member-states, ratification by the other 14 member-states is seen as a foregone conclusion.
Campaigners against Nice hope rejection would lead to a renegotiation of treaty provisions to which they object, or to some formula whereby Ireland could opt out of these. This could also delay the process of admitting new members from central and eastern Europe.
The Taoiseach and Ministers for Foreign Affairs and Finance will travel to Gothenburg in Sweden late next week for an EU summit, either with the treaty safely ratified or facing a period of intensive political discussion with their European counterparts on how to proceed.
Government Ministers who have been campaigning on the ground said yesterday they were confident that the treaty referendum would be carried. Some predicted a Yes vote of 55 per cent or higher, although others believed the margin could be narrower.
A spokesman for the No to Nice campaign, Mr Justin Barrett, predicted a 53 or 54 per cent No vote.
The referendums on the prohibition of the death penalty and the establishment of the International Criminal Court, also taking place today, are expected to be approved by a clear margin.
The dispute over campaign funding continued yesterday, with the Minister of State, Mr Willie O'Dea, challenging the leading No campaigner, Mr Anthony Coughlan, over the cost of anti-Nice advertisements taken out in three daily newspapers yesterday by the National Platform group in conjunction with TEAM, an umbrella group of Eurosceptics based in Brussels.
Mr O'Dea said the advertisements were part of a "misinformation campaign" and had cost over £40,000. The National Platform "appear to have resorted to overseas funding from a major anti-Europe organisation," he said.
However, Mr Coughlan replied that the advertisements were "being substantially funded by me, personally, out of the pension lump sum that I received last year on my retirement from full-time teaching in Trinity College Dublin".
The remaining costs were met by donations from various individuals to the National Platform and TEAM. The main sources of foreign donations were Denmark and Sweden. "Nothing significant has come from Britain," he said.
The Taoiseach last night made a final appeal for voters to turn out today and to vote Yes. "A failure to ratify the Nice Treaty would seriously complicate and delay the enlargement process," he maintained.
However, a spokesman for the anti-Nice Peace and Neutrality Alliance (PANA), Mr Feargus Mac Aogain, made an eve-of-poll appeal "to people who have not had time to read the treaty to vote No so that there can be a proper debate before the treaty needs to be ratified at the end of 2002".
Polling stations open this morning at 8 a.m. and close at 9 p.m. The count will begin tomorrow morning, with the Nice Treaty referendum ballots being counted first.
A result on Nice is expected by 6 p.m. or earlier, after which the referendum on the death penalty will be counted, followed by that on the International Criminal Court.
The length of the count depends on the turnout, but counting could continue until midnight or later.