Irish PM Ahern set for 3rd term in close race

DUBLIN, May 25 (Reuters) Irish Prime Minister Bertie Ahern was on course to win a third successive term today but may have to find a new coalition partner to be sure of a parliamentary majority, pollsters and political analysts said.

''It's very tight,'' former prime minister Garret FitzGerald said as officials counted votes cast in yesterday's election.

''In the last week, voters have swung back to (Ahern's) Fianna Fail,'' he told Reuters at a Dublin counting centre. ''On the exit poll it looks as if they have the advantage.'' Broadcaster RTE said an exit poll by Lansdowne Market Research showed support for Fianna Fail at 41.6 percent, little changed from the 2002 election but higher than the 38 per cent registered in the last opinion poll of the campaign.

In an election where there was little separating the main parties on tax and spending, opponents tapped into a sense that the spoils of Ireland's economic boom had been squandered, pointing to overstretched health and transport services.

Ahern helped bring peace to Northern Ireland during a decade in power when his country became one of Europe's richest but had to fend off questions over his personal finances and a joint bid by the two main opposition parties to oust him.

Support for Ahern's junior coalition partner, the pro-business Progressive Democrats, seems to have fallen and the exit poll gave the two governing parties a combined 44 percent.

That is below the winning 46 per cent that secured them 89 representatives in the 166-seat Dail (lower house of parliament) in the 2002 general election.

The most likely opposition government, known as the 'rainbow coalition' and made up of centrist Fine Gael, left-leaning Labour and the unaligned Green Party, had a 41 percent share.

''Based on these numbers Bertie Ahern is going to be Taoiseach (prime minister),'' said political analyst Noel Whelan.

''The question is, who's going to be in government with Bertie Ahern?'' Ahern may have to lure a rival such as Labour or the Greens on to his side if the official results mirror the poll. The backing of a few independent lawmakers could also be enough.

LONG NIGHT AHEAD Labour, which fought the election on a joint platform with Fine Gael, said during the campaign it would not enter government with Fianna Fail.

But speaking to Reuters yesterday, Labour leader Pat Rabbitte left the door ajar to a deal with Ahern's party.

Sinn Fein, ally of the Irish Republican Army (IRA) which entered a ground-breaking new government in religiously divided Northern Ireland this month, does not look to have made the breakthrough in the south it had sought.

The exit poll showed backing for the party at 7.3 percent, which was up slightly but short of the 9-10 per cent expected.

Exit and opinion polls in Ireland can be deceptive, however, given the country's complex proportional representation electoral system. It also means counts and recounts continue late into the night with some likely to resume tomorrow.

''There has been a lot of interest and intrigue in this election nd few will say they are not watching this minute by minute,'' said Anthony King, a 42 year-old driver outside one of Dublin's counts.

''I will be watching this one to the end.'' REUTERS RJ ND1834