Sinn Féin has done well in The Irish Times opinion poll but while the party attracts young voters, it won't get many transfers, suggests Mark Hennessy
Younger voters will hold the key to Sinn Féin's general election performance if they can be encouraged to get out and vote on polling day. The Irish Times/MRBI poll, which gave Sinn Féin its strongest showing so far, estimates that the party's core support is now running at 6 per cent nationally.
In fact, the core vote stands at 8 per cent in Dublin, where the party is particularly hopeful about councillor Mr Sean Crowe's chances in Dublin South West and Mr Aengus Ó Snodaigh's in South Central.
Significantly, Sinn Féin commands the backing of 13 per cent of 18 to 24-year-olds in the capital, over double the percentage enjoyed by the Labour Party.
Mr Robbie Smyth, one of the party's strategists, declares: "The numbers are not unexpected. A lot of young people do not have the prejudices built up by the establishment."
Predictably, the analysis from Labour's second candidate in Dublin South Central, Mr Eric Byrne, who has clashed frequently with Sinn Féin over the years, differs.
Believing that much of Sinn Féin's support will melt away, he said: "Expectations won't be fulfilled. It is one thing to say that you'll vote for them. It is another to get out of bed and actually do it."
However, he acknowledges that Sinn Féin is striking a chord with youthful disillusionment and anger.
Sinn Féin has had a strong presence in some of the most marginal communities for several years, helped by the 1,600 former republican prisoners living in Dublin.
Well funded, the party is also able to draw on a core of volunteers, often unemployed, who are prepared to work for "the cause" for a pittance.
Sinn Féin is still emphasising its aim is to increase its total vote rather than the number of seats. This is because its vote in many areas will still not put it in striking distance of a seat.
The full list of candidates will be agreed by mid-February. So far, it has decided to run in seven Dublin constituencies; four elsewhere in Leinster, five in Connacht/Ulster and four in Munster.
The key targets remain the same: Mr Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin in Cavan Monaghan; Mr Sean Crowe; and Mr Martin Ferris, the convicted IRA gun-runner, in Kerry North.
Now including Ballyfermot, Inchicore and Kilmainham, Dublin South Central offers more fertile territory for Sinn Féin since it became a five-seater in the 1998 Boundary Commission review.
"Aengus Ó Snodaigh has a great chance there. A huge amount of work has been done by our people on the ground," said Sinn Féin official Ms Dawn Doyle.
If Mr Ó Snodaigh and other party candidates in the capital are to do well it will, at least partly, have to be at the expense of an increasingly-worried Labour Party.
Both Mr Ó Snodaigh and another party candidate, Dublin North West's Mr Dessie Ellis, could hinder Mr Eric Byrne and Ms Róisín Shortall, even if they cannot get elected themselves.
In Louth, the bigger parties are more hopeful than they were a few months ago that the threat posed by Sinn Féin's Omeath-based Mr Arthur Morgan can be nullified.
Curiously, Sinn Féin has already begun to point out the difficulties which Mr Ferris will face getting a place on the podium in the three-seat Kerry South.
In 1997, Mr Ferris was 300 votes ahead of Fianna Fáil's Mr Denis Foley on the first count, yet he was beaten when Mr Foley received the bulk of running mate Mr Tom McEllistrim's vote.
"That is the key to Sinn Féin's problem. They don't get transfers," said one Fianna Fáil source.
Sinn Féin insists that the 2002 election is but one step on a long road. "If some places don't deliver a seat this time, they will do so the next," said Ms Doyle.