The Pact: How Sinn Féin won the 2016 mayoralty

Following last year's local elections, Sinn Féin was the largest party on the city council, with 16 of the 63 seats. They had a healthy margin ahead of the next largest party, Fianna Fáil, who won nine seats.

Labour and Fine Gael both had eight seats. People Before Profit had five and the Green Party had three.

United Left and the Anti Austerity Alliance had one seat each and there were 12 Independents.

While Sinn Féin were clearly the heavyweights, forming a power-sharing pact on the council was always going to be more complicated than in the previous council.

In that council, Labour and Fine Gael, the two largest parties by quite a distance, took turns at holding the mayoralty.

Arrangement

An attempt was made last June to form an arrangement, whereby the position would rotate between parties.

However, this collapsed after Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil pulled out of negotiations at the last minute, over fears Sinn Féin would hijack the Rising commemorations.

Instead, Sinn Féin entered into a coalition with Labour, the Green Party and most Independent councillors.

The agreement sees Sinn Féin and Independents holding the mayoralty for two terms each, with Labour holding it for a single term.